The Body in Language : Comparative Studies of Linguistic Embodiment [1 ed.] 9789004274297, 9789004274280

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The Body in Language

Brill’s Studies in Language, Cognition and Culture Series Editors Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald (Cairns Institute, James Cook University) R.M.W. Dixon (Cairns Institute, James Cook University) N.J. Enfield (Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen)

VOLUME 8

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/bslc

The Body in Language Comparative Studies of Linguistic Embodiment Edited by

Matthias Brenzinger and Iwona Kraska-Szlenk

LEIDEN | BOSTON

Cover illustration: Makonde “shetani” sculpture. Photo courtesy of Iwona Kraska-Szlenk. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The Body in language: comparative studies of linguistic embodiment / Edited by Matthias Brenzinger and Iwona Kraska-Szlenk.   pages cm. — (Brill’s studies in language, cognition and culture; Volume 8)  Most of the chapters of the present volume developed from papers presented at the international conference “The Body in Language” held in Warsaw on the 21–22 October 2011.  Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.  ISBN 978-90-04-27428-0 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-90-04-27429-7 (e-book) 1. Language and languages—Origin. 2. Semantics—Psychological aspects. 3. Gesture. 4. Cognitive grammar. 5. Metaphor. 6. Metonyms. 7. Anthropological linguistics. I. Brenzinger, Matthias, 1957- editor. II. Kraska, Iwona, editor.  P325.5.P78B634 2014  401—dc23 2014015504

This publication has been typeset in the multilingual ‘Brill’ typeface. With over 5,100 characters covering Latin, ipa, Greek, and Cyrillic, this typeface is especially suitable for use in the humanities. For more information, please see brill.com/brill-typeface. issn 1879-5412 isbn 978 90 04 27428 0 (hardback) isbn 978 90 04 27429 7 (e-book) Copyright 2014 by Koninklijke Brill nv, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill nv incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Nijhoff, Global Oriental and Hotei Publishing. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill nv provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, ma 01923, usa. Fees are subject to change. This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Contents Preface  ix Notes on Contributors  x The Body in Language: An Introduction  1 Matthias Brenzinger and Iwona Kraska-Szlenk

Grammaticalization and Lexicalization Patterns of Body Part Terms  11 The Body in Language: Observations from Grammaticalization  13 Bernd Heine Grammaticalization of Body-Part Terms in Ethiosemitic  33 Abinet Sime Gebreyes Extending Body-Part Terms in the Domain of Emotions  52 Iwona Kraska-Szlenk Corporeal Incorporation and Extension in Dene Sųłiné (Athapaskan) Lexicalization  71 Sally Rice The Cow’s Body as the Source Domain of Philosophical Metaphors in the Ṛgveda: The Case of ‘Udder’ (ūdhar)  98 Joanna Jurewicz

Conceptualization of the Body and Self  117 Our Collocating Body Parts: Recurring Images of Self and Other in the Use of English Body-Part Terms  119 John Newman Notions of SELF in Hausa  140 Nina Pawlak

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Embodied Language and Other Modalities  161 Hausa Metaphors: Gestural Idioms Containing Body-Part Terms  163 Izabela Will The Up/Down Orientation in Language and Music  177 Elżbieta Górska

Case Studies from Africa  197 Embodiment in Zande  199 Helma Pasch Body Parts We Live By in Language and Culture: The raaS ‘Head’ and yidd ‘Hand’ in Tunisian Arabic  224 Zouheir Maalej What Hands/Arms Can Say: A Corpus-Based Analysis of the Swahili Body-Part Terms Mkono and Mikono  260 Serena Talento Grammaticalization of Body Part Terms in Mundabli  284 Rebecca Voll Whomever It Concerns—Notions of Control, Initiation and Affectedness in Expressions of Body-Centred Activities in Mbembe  299 Doris Richter genannt Kemmermann Sexual, Impure, Vulgar: An Analysis of the Intimate Body-Part Terms in Egyptian Arabic  316 Magdalena Zawrotna

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Case Studies from Europe  333 Selected Body-Part Terms as a Means for Conveying Abstract Concepts in The Economist: The Case of Head, Eye, Mouth and Nose  335 Tatiana Szczygłowska Semiotic Conceptualization of the Human Body and the Case Study of Russian ‘Navel’  357 Grigory Kreydlin, Svetlana Pereverzeva and Lidia Khesed Author Index  373 Language Index  378 Subject Index  380

Preface Most of the chapters of the present volume developed from papers presented at the international conference “The Body in Language” held in Warsaw on the 21–22 October 2011. The conference was organized by the University of Warsaw in collaboration with the University of Cologne. All contributions were peerreviewed and we would like to thank the reviewers of the papers, as well as the authors for their contributions. We are particularly obliged to Alexandra Aikhenvald for her insightful comments as series editor. We wish to acknowledge the financial support of the University of Warsaw, the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education (the grant no N N104 387640 to Iwona Kraska-Szlenk), as well as of the Fritz-Thyssen Foundation, Cologne.

Notes on Contributors Abinet Sime Gebreyes is currently doing his PhD at Addis Ababa University. His PhD thesis is on grammaticalisation in Ethiosemitic with comparisons to Oromo. His ma thesis was on the grammaticalisation of the morpheme ge ‘land, time’ across Ethiosemitic languages. Abinet has been a lecturer of language and linguistics at Mekelle University for nine years. The main fields of his academic interests are historical linguistics, grammaticalisation, Amharic phonology, etymology, orthography, and lexicography. Matthias Brenzinger holds the Mellon Research Chair: African Language Diversity and is Head of Linguistics in the School of African & Gender Studies, Anthropology and Linguistics at the University of Cape Town. Since 2012, he is Director of caldi—Centre for African Language Diversity and Curator of tala—The African Language Archive, both at uct. Brenzinger has been a member of the Institute of African Language Studies at the University of Cologne for 28 years. The main fields of his academic interest are cognitive linguistics, ethno-botany, language classification, language documentation, applied linguistics, bimodal communication, language endangerment and sociolinguistics. Elżbieta Górska is Professor in the Institute of English Studies, University of Warsaw, teaching also doctoral students in the Faculty of Oriental Studies. Her research interests include multimodal metaphor, conceptual metonymy, word formation, cognitive grammar, cognitive foundations of language and linguistic coding of concepts in cross-cultural perspective. She has previously published On Parts and Wholes. A Cognitive Study of English Schematic Part Terms (Warsaw University, 1999), edited the first Polish collection of articles in cognitive linguistics Images from the Cognitive Scene (Universitas, 1993), and co-edited (with Günter Radden) Metonymy-Metaphor Collage (Warsaw University Press, 2005). Bernd Heine held the chair for African Language Studies at the University of Cologne from 1978 to 2004. In the 1960s and 1970s he spent six years at the University of Nairobi, first as lecturer and later as visiting professor His main focal points in

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research and teaching are African linguistics, language sociology, grammaticalisation theory and language contact. His life’s work comprises 33 books and about 120 periodical articles in the fields of linguistics, sociolinguistics, historical linguistics and grammaticalisation theory. The grammaticalisation theory, which deals with the changes in grammar, and to which he contributed 7 books and numerous articles, is his main focal point. Joanna Jurewicz is Professor at the Oriental Studies Department of Warsaw University. In her research, she uses the interdisciplinary methodology of philology and cognitive linguistics to analyse ancient Indian texts (Vedic texts and philosophical parts of the Mahābhārata, especially the Bhagavadgīta and the Mokšadharmaparvan) and religious and cultural aspects of Hindu tradition. Lidia Khesed obtained her PhD in linguistics (2013) with a focus on Russian polite and impolite behavior and their distinctive features. Since 2007 she is involved in research on non-verbal semiotics at the Institute of Linguistics of Russian State University for the Humanities. The main fields of her professional interest are non-verbal semiotics, politeness, impoliteness, contemporary Russian language and language of Russian gestures. Iwona Kraska-Szlenk is a member of the Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Warsaw, where she teaches linguistics and Swahili language and literature at the Department of African Languages and Cultures. She also runs the Faculty’s Languages Lab. Her previous research focused mainly on phonology and morphology within the Optimality Theoretic framework and from a usage-based perspective. Her more recent academic interests include lexical semantics and language-­ culture interface within the model of Cognitive Linguistics. Grigory Kreydlin is a professor at the Institute of linguistics in Russian State University for the Humanities in Moscow, Russia and leads a research project on non-verbal semiotics. He has been visiting professor at a number of universities, including the University of Rochester (usa), University of Michigan (usa), University of Berlin (Germany), Kiev University (Ukraine). He published more than 240 scientific articles and 8 books. The main fields of his research are theoretical linguistics, general and nonverbal semiotics, semiotics of culture, gender linguistics, theory of the dialogue, logical analysis of natural

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language, school and university educational methods in linguistics and mathematics. Zouheir Maalej holds a Ph.D. from the University of Tunis and is currently professor of cognitive linguistics at King Saud University. From 1999 to 2004, he was the chair of the department of English language and literature at the University of Manouba, Tunisia. Maalej is a member of several journal and book editorial boards, and has published extensively in international journals. He organised an international conference (raam4) on Metaphor, Cognition, and Culture in 2001, and edited a volume (2005) with the same title. He has also co-edited (with Ning Yu) a volume on embodiment (2011). His research interests include Cognitive Linguistics, Critical Metaphor Analysis, Critical Discourse Analysis, and Cognitive Pragmatics. John Newman is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Linguistics, University of Alberta, Canada. He has worked as a linguist in Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada and has carried out linguistic field work in Papua New Guinea. His main research focus has been the syntax and semantics of verbs in a Cognitive Linguistic framework. He is currently the Editor-in-Chief of the journal Cognitive Linguistics. His research interests include the creation of corpora such as the online Wenzhou Spoken Corpus and the application of quantitative methodologies within corpus linguistics. Helma Pasch is a member of the Institute of African Studies at the University of Cologne. Her academic interests cover Ubangi languages, in particular Sango and Zande, modern African writing systems, sociolinguistics, African languages and the new media, and collaborative e-learning. Nina Pawlak is Head of the Department of African Languages and Cultures, University of Warsaw. Her academic interests focus on Hausa as well as other Chadic languages with a comparative perspective. Main fields of her linguistic investigation are typology, language development, cognitive linguistics, culture and communication. 

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Svetlana Pereverzeva is lecturing at the Department of the Russian Language at Russian State University for the Humanities in Moscow. She obtained her PhD in linguistics in 2013. Main fields of her professional interest are non-verbal semiotics, lexicography, semantics, teaching foreign languages as well as Hindi. Sally Rice is Professor of Linguistics at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada, where she specialises in syntax/semantics and language documentation. She is former director of cilldi, the Canadian Indigenous Languages and Literature Development Institute. Since 2001, she has taught a number of speakers of Canadian Aboriginal languages at annual summer schools. She has been conducting field work on several Dene (or Athapaskan) languages for over 20 years. Her research interests include grammaticalisation and lexicalisation, cognitive linguistics, corpus linguistics, as well as interactional and multimodal communication. Doris Richter genannt Kemmermann was a member of the Institute for African Language Studies, University of Cologne from 2007 to 2013. She documented Mbembe (Jukunoid, Northwest Cameroon), as well as Isubu and Wovia, both Bantu A languages spoken in Southwest Cameroon. In 2013, she joined the research group Meaning, Culture and Cognition at the Centre for Language Studies, Radboud University, Nijmegen, to conduct research on olfactory language. Her research comprises language documentation and description, the relation between language, culture, and conceptual categories, speech repertoires/ multilingualism, and language contact. Tatiana Szczygłowska is lecturer in linguistics at the University of Bielsko-Biała, Poland and more recently teaches also translation studies. Her research interests include corpus linguistics, English as a lingua franca and contrastive discourse analysis, with a special focus on written academic discourse. Serena Talento graduated in 2011 from the University of Naples “L’Orientale” (Italy) in Languages and Cultures of Africa and Translation Studies where she specialised in Swahili language and literature. Since 2012 she is Junior Fellow at the Bayreuth International Graduate School of African Studies (bigsas,

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Germany) where she is pursuing a PhD on translation into Swahili. Her main research interests include cognitive linguistics, sociolinguistics, corpus linguistics, translation history, postcolonial translation theories, ideology and translation, political discourse and translation. Rebecca Voll is writing a descriptive grammar of Mundabli, a Yemne-Kimbi (formerly known as Beboid) language spoken in Northwest Cameroon as her PhD thesis at Leiden University. Her research interests include typology, language description and documentation, contact linguistics, Pidgin and Creole languages and (especially tonal) phonology. Izabela Will is Assistant Professor in the Department of African Languages and Cultures at the University of Warsaw where she teaches Hausa language, linguistics, intercultural communication and African art. Her academic work focuses on Hausa language and culture in Northern Nigeria as well as nonverbal communication. Magdalena Zawrotna is a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Philology, Jagiellonian University, Poland, conducting research on Egyptian dialects with her doctoral thesis focusing on linguistic taboos and politeness in the language of young Egyptians. Her main research interests are Arabic dialectology, Arabic socio- and pragmalinguistics, and issues of culture, globalisation, gender and education in the Middle East.

The Body in Language: An Introduction Matthias Brenzinger and Iwona Kraska-Szlenk Introduction The interplay of language, culture and the human body has developed into a major field of study in semantics in the past decades. Much of this research has been conducted within the framework of Cognitive Linguistics. George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s notions of embodiment and experientialism, as well as their work on the role of metaphor and metonymy in conceptualization and linguistic structure proposed an alternative to formal semantic theories (Lakoff & Johnson 1980, 1999, Johnson 1987, Lakoff 1987). The term embodiment was initially used in the meaning of a bodily, experiential basis underlying human interaction. The world, however, does not only motivate pre-conceptual schemata, but also the very conceptualization of things as well as abstract notions, and with that it influences the linguistic form. Lakoff and Johnson (1999: 3–4) underline the fact that “[t]he mind is inherently embodied” and that “the very structure of reason itself comes from the details of our human embodiment. The same neural and cognitive mechanisms that allow us to perceive and move around also create our conceptual systems and models of reason”. Categorization, they argue “is determined by the structure of the brain and the information flow and memorizing; the information received by neurons must be “categorized” in order to be passed by a much smaller set of synaptic connections” (Lakoff & Johnson 1999: 17). Neural evidence for the embodied character of language has come up in numerous studies devoted to various kinds of phenomena (e.g. Barsalou 2008, Bergen et al. 2010, Siakaluk et al. 2011). Lakoff and Johnson’s concepts of embodiment and experientialism were further developed in different directions and became influential in various areas of linguistics and cultural studies, as well as in psychology, anthropology, biosemiotics, neurology, and other sciences (cf. Csordas 1994, Gibbs 2006, McPherron & Ramanathan 2011, Rohrer 2007, Ziemke, Zlatev & Frank 2007). While in comparative studies embodiment exhibits language universals, it manifests itself in a wide range of “parameterization” of embodied metaphors with various paths of lexical extensions. Recent years have brought about a number of studies which concentrate on the interaction between embodiment and language-specific cultural models (Enfield and Wierzbicka 2002, Kövecses 2000, 2005, 2010, Maalej and Yu 2011, Sharifian 2011, Sharifian et al. 2008, Wierzbicka 1999). However, far more

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important is that embodiment fundamentally underlies human conceptualization in that the “human body provides one of the most salient models for understanding, describing, and denoting concepts that are more difficult to understand, describe, and denote” (Heine, this volume). Soteria Svorou (1993: 1) begins her book The Grammar of Space with the crucial observation that “We experience this world in ways that are determined by our biological make-up.” Knowledge is typically conceptualized through the bodily actions associated with the perception of the world. Research in the semantic fields of perception and cognition have led to the postulation of linguistic universals regarding the hierarchy of verbs of perception SEE > HEARING > TOUCH > TASTE/SMELL (Viberg 1984) and their extensions into the realm of cognition. Primacy of the visual domain has been claimed across all cultures and languages of the world (Sweetser 1990); however, more recent research on non-European languages has challenged this view. Examples from Australian languages show that ‘hearing’ is the core perception of cognition that leads to understanding (Evans & Wilkins 2000). A verb with the meaning ‘perceiving food’ combining the sensory modalities of taste, smell and touch is the source domain for acquiring knowledge in some Khoeid languages of Southern Africa (Brenzinger & Fehn 2013). In all languages of the world, however, sensory modalities seem to expand from the bodily function to perception, then to cognition, and, finally, to knowledge. “Grammaticalization is defined as the development from lexical to grammatical forms, and from grammatical to even more grammatical forms” (Heine, this volume). The principle of unidirectionality in semantic change has been the main claim in research within the grammaticalization framework (Bybee et al. 1994, Heine 1997, Heine & Kuteva 2002, Heine et al. 1991a, b, Svorou 1986, 1993, Sweetser 1990, Traugott & Heine 1991, Traugott & Dasher 2002) and most studies aim “at reconstructing regularities in the evolution of conceptual transfer across languages” (Heine, this volume). Studies in the grammaticalization framework demonstrate that conceptualizations underlying languages in very different semantic fields are often motivated by body-part models. Heine (1997: 18–34), for example, claims that numeral systems for counting across the languages of the world are nonarbitrary in that they are motivated by the anatomic characteristic of the human body. The most common base numbers are 5, 10, 15, 20 in analogy with the digits of the human body, i.e. hand + hand + foot + foot. In his contribution to this volume, Heine adds examples in which actual names of body-parts extend their meanings to number words. In Zulu, names for ‘fingers’ become linguistic expressions for ‘numerals’, i.e. isithupha, literally ‘the thumb’ for the number 6 and isikhombisa, literally ‘the index finger’ for the number 7. Pasch, this

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volume, provides examples from Zande, for ‘hand’ as ‘5’, ‘two hands’ for ‘10’ and boro ‘body, flesh’ for ‘20’. The human body in an upright position provides structural templates for expressing spatial regions in all languages of the world. In a comparative study, Heine (1997:42) found that the source for the spatial term ‘front’ is the body part term ‘face’ in roughly 50% of the African languages in his sample and in more than 70% of the Oceanic languages of the study. The body-part term for ‘eye’ provides a source for expressing ‘front’ in almost 16% of the African languages. Heine claims that ‘eye’ is a very frequent conceptual source for ‘face’ in African languages thus revealing an earlier phase of the chain in semantic change, i.e. ‘eye’ > ‘face’ > ‘front’. ‘Forehead’, ‘mouth’ and also ‘head’ frequently occur as source concepts for ‘front’ in languages from the African continent, while ‘belly’ for ‘front’ is almost exclusively found in Oceanic languages. Spatial concepts typically derive from a limited set of body-part terms, but some languages use a much wider bodily range to code spatial notions such as Abhaz (Hewitt 1979, Svorou 1986), or Ewe (Ameka 1995). Emotions are often conceptualized as ‘things’ residing in a metaphoric ‘container’ associated with the inner organs. Emotions are associated with bodily sensation or other bodily effects and this makes inner organs a likely donor for expressing emotions. The heart, the stomach or the liver are found in figurative language on emotions in by far most languages of the world (Sharifian et al. 2008).

The Chapters of This Volume

The present volume focuses on the ‘body’ as the donor domain for conceptual transfers to a wide range of target domains. The case studies are on various languages from different continents and while some contributions highlight specific body-part terms, others focus on certain target domains. The theoretical reflections of the authors are on grammaticalization, lexical semantics, philosophy, multimodal communication and—by discussing metaphorization and metonymy in figurative language—they also contribute to Cognitive Linguistics. The book is divided into five sections highlighting specific aspects of linguistic embodiment. The first section entitled Grammaticalization and Lexicalization Patterns of Body Part Terms concentrates on general trends in grammaticalization and lexicalization of body-part terms, as well as on the paths of diachronic semantic change and synchronic extension.

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Within a grammaticalization framework, Bernd Heine discusses crosslinguistically recurrent conceptual transfers and grammaticalization paths in which body-parts extend meanings to various target concepts. Heine follows up on conceptual transfers that start off from ‘head’, ‘heart’, ‘eye/face’, ‘back’, ‘belly’, ‘body’, ‘hands’, ‘fingers’, ‘stomach’, ‘liver’, ‘bile’, and ‘intestines/guts’. In Heine’s findings, the ‘head’ appears as source for a wide spectrum of target domains, i.e. spatial orientation, reference identity, dynamic and social relations, and emotions. Other body-parts are more limited with regard to target domains. For example, the ‘heart’ neither appears in reference identity nor dynamic situations. ‘Fingers’ are among the most restricted body-parts according to Heine’s survey, as they are donor for only one target domain, namely number. Heine argues that linguistic structure is not arbitrary but rather motivated in that his findings are verifiable by means of historical analysis. Abinet Sime Gebreyes also applies a grammaticalization framework in his survey of Ethiopian Semitic (Afroasiatic) languages. He discusses gramaticalized forms which he reconstructs to body-part terms as source domain. He first presents grammaticalization processes in which body-nouns develop into adverbs and adpositions and then demonstrates further developments into subordinators and other notions. While both Heine and Abinet discuss semantic change from a diachronic perspective, a synchronic, usage-based approach to extensions of body-part terms is taken on by Iwona Kraska-Szlenk. By focusing on the domain of emotions, she argues that cross-linguistic convergence of figurative extensions is due to a strong metonymic basis of widely shared metaphors, such as, locus of emotions is a (particular) body part or dear person is eye. Likewise common are cross-cultural metonymies, such as, face (facial manifestations) for emotions, or object of emotion for emotion. Sally Rice discusses Athapaskan languages in which both diachronic semantic changes and synchronic productive extensions are illustrated by intricate patterns of incorporated body-part terms. In these languages, an impressive number of figurative meanings can be rendered through verbal incorporation as well as other syntactic means. Rice provides cross-linguistic evidence for new paths in grammaticalization and lexicalization. In these languages, event types, such as posture, consumption, perception, ideation or emotion often incorporate body-part terms. Rice illustrates with ‘chest’ for person’s ‘body’ or ‘chest’ for ‘name’ that historical developments might not always be detectable. The shifts in this example might have been from either chest → body → name or from chest to both, i.e. body ← chest → name. In most case studies presented in this volume, it is generally the human body that serves as the source domain in conceptual transfers. Joanna Jurewicz

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in her chapter, however, discusses a zoomorphic model shared by an ancient Indian community, in which the Cosmos is conceived in terms of a bull and a cow. She analyses the philosophical dimension of the cow’s udder in poetical hymns from Sanskrit between the 15th and 13th centuries B.C. and demonstrates the relevance of the linguistic outcomes for Cognitive Linguistics and grammaticalization. This chapter demonstrates a remarkable development of philosophical concepts and apparatus through a zoomorphic body model, being thus an important contribution to the discussion of embodiment more generally. The next four contributions examine linguistic embodiment in relation to various social and cultural phenomena from perspectives which go beyond body-part terms with the first two chapters grouped under the heading Conceptualization of the Body and Self. John Newman provides a new way of looking at the concepts of ‘self’, contrasted with ‘other’. In his corpus-based study of English, he looks at the frequency and co-occurrence in close proximity of body-part terms such as: hand(s), finger(s) and arm(s), and their collocates, which themselves constitute other body-part terms, e.g. knee or hair, in order to determine their referents as either ‘self’ or ‘other’. He presents a large number of correlations and relationships of meanings that have been so far overlooked in studies on semantic shifts. The multiple dimensions of interconnectedness of body-part terms and concepts open new questions for studying polysemy and diachronic shifts. Nina Pawlak discusses the body and self-identity in Hausa, a Chadic language of the Afroasiatic family, spoken in West Africa. Pawlak analyses numerous strategies of self-reference in Hausa and demonstrates that the notions of ‘person’ and ‘self’ have various linguistic instantiations that reflect different conceptualizations which are appropriate for specific contexts. An emphasis is on expressions with the body-part terms kai ‘head’, jiki ‘body’ and others. The following section entitled Embodied Language and Other Modalities contains two chapters in which embodied meaning is expressed not only linguistically, but also with gesture, image or music. Izabela Will elaborates on the relationship of bodily gestures and verbal gestural idioms in Hausa. She distinguishes between verbal expressions that aim at capturing the performance of the gesture and gestural idioms that express the message encoded by the gesture. Will provides a large number of examples of gestural idioms containing body-part terms, including some which remained in the lexicon while the gestures themselves are no longer performed. She demonstrates how various gestures, conventional emblems specific to the Hausa culture, provide a source domain for abstract concepts

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expressed in the target domain by linguistic means. Numerous examples of idiomatic expressions based on body-part terms are analyzed, e.g. zumɓura baki ‘twisting mouth’ describes a specific gesture, but it may also convey an abstract meaning of contempt and dissatisfaction. Elżbieta Górska contributes to multimodal studies of metaphor by discussing the linguistic coding of up/down orientation, while also considering this image schema from the perspective of other modalities. A special focus is on music in which verbo-musical metaphors function as ‘text painting’. The last two sections provide specific case studies from African and European languages. They not only contribute new and rich linguistic material, but also provoke novel theoretical interpretations of original language data. The section Case Studies from Africa comprises six chapters and starts with a contribution by Helma Pasch who presents findings from Zande, an Ubangian language spoken in Sudan, Central African Republic, and Democratic Republic of Congo. Pasch discusses extensions of body-part terms to target domains such as emotions, cognition, spatial and temporal relations, and numerals. Particular attention is paid to a highly grammaticalized term be ‘hand’. She also provides evidence for a zoomorphic conceptual model in architectural constructions. Zouheir Maalej illustrates the metaphoric and metonymic use of ‘head’ and ‘hand’ in Tunesian Arabic for which a large number of examples illustrate a wide range of target domains. The main claim of his discussion, however, is that internal body-parts are a more likely source for metaphors on mental faculties and emotions than those for character traits or cultural values. ‘Head’ and ‘hand’, as external major body-part terms mainly serve as source domains in conceptualization of mental faculties, character traits and cultural values, creating complex cultural models of Tunisian Arabic. In the following chapter, Serena Talento analyses the Swahili term mkono ‘hand/arm’. Like many other languages, Swahili does not consider hand and arm as separate body-parts, but as one. The English translations of the Swahili metaphorical and metonymical uses of mkono often ask for either ‘arm’ or ‘hand’. The target domains discussed for mkono are ‘objects’, ‘interpersonal relationships’ and ‘notions of possession, domination and authority’. Using a corpus-based approach, Talento offers a thorough study of literal uses of this body-part term, as well as its metaphori­cal and metonymical extensions onto abstract concepts. Rebecca Voll analyses the grammaticalization of body-part terms mainly in the target domain spatial relations in Mundabli. While the common developments are from body-part nouns to either other nouns or to spatial postpositions, she claims the existence of a third type in this Bantoid language spoken

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in Cameroon, namely postnominal body-part constructions. Voll demonstrates that body-part terms in these particular structures differ from both nouns and postpositions. Doris Richter genannt Kemmermann presents her data from Mbembe, a Benue-Congo language spoken in the borderland between Nigeria and Cameroon. In her contribution, she analyses body-centred activities, i.e. physical processes and states related to perception, cognition and emotions. Richter demonstrates that various factors in addition to the semantics of the verb, such as topic or intention can influence expressions on body-centred activities. She highlights the notion of control exerted over the activity, classified as a continuum from controllable activities to non-controllable ones, and shows how this feature affects the syntax. Magdalena Zawrotna’s contribution on Egyptian Arabic discusses intimate body-parts and their names, which are taboo like in most societies. She analyses this special set of body-part terms as well as expressions for activities associated with them in terms of a double stigmatization that derives from two forbidden domains, namely sexuality and excretion. The author describes the use of these terms as insults, explains euphemisms as well as the differences in terms for male and female bodies and the variation in their use. European languages have generally been better described than African languages, but the following two case studies provide novel approaches and new data from English and Russian. Tatiana Szczygłowska reviews abstract economic concepts that are expressed through metaphorical and metonymic extensions of the English body-part terms head, eye, nose and mouth. She bases her study on contemporary articles published in The Economist and quantifies and qualifies her results; head occurs by far most often, mainly metonymically for ‘person’, followed by eye for ‘watching’. Szczygłowska demonstrates how complex, abstract economic concepts are made more familiar and convincing to the readers through metaphor mapping. Grigory E. Kreydlin, Svetlana I. Pereverzeva and Lidia A. Khesed present their study on the semiotic conceptualization of the human body in Russian. They provide a categorization of somatic objects into several semantic and functional groups on the basis of distinctive features peculiar to corporeal sign units, by focusing in particular on the semiotic conceptualization of the body-part ‘navel’ in Russian. This small, but highly symbolic body-part has never been discussed in the literature so thoroughly. The analysis, conducted on the Russian corpus data, pinpoints the specifics of this particular cultural model, but also identifies universal features which have parallels in other languages.

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References Ameka, Felix K. 1995. The linguistic construction of space in Ewe, Cognitive Linguistics 6–2/3: 139–181. Barsalou, Lawrence W. 2008. Grounding symbolic operations in the brains modal systems, in Gün R. Semin and Eliot R. Smith (eds.) Embodied Grounding: Social, Cognitive, Affective, and Neuroscientific Approaches. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 8–42. Bergen, Benjamin, Ting-Ting Chan Lau, Shweta Narayan, Diana Stojanovic and Kathryn Wheeler. 2010. Body parts representations in verbal semantics, Memory and Cognition 38/7: 969–981. Brenzinger, Matthias and Anne-Maria Fehn. 2013. From body to knowledge: Perception and Cognition in Khwe-Ani and Ts’ixa, in: Alexandra Aikenvald & Anne Storch (eds.) Perception and Cognition. Leiden, Boston: Brill. 119–142. Bybee, Joan, Revere Perkins and William Pagliuca, 1994. The Evolution of Grammar: Tense, Aspect, and Modality in the Languages of the World. Chicago/London: University of Chicago. Csordas, Thomas J. (ed.) 1994. Embodiment and Experience: The Existential Ground of Culture and Self. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Deignan, Alice and Liz Potter. 2004. A corpus study of metaphors and metonyms in English and Italian, Journal of Pragmatics 36: 1231–1252. Enfield, N. J. and Anna Wierzbicka (eds.) 2002. The Body in Description of Emotion: Cross-Linguistic Studies. Special issue of Pragmatics & Cognition 10, 1/2 (2002). Evans, Nicholas and David Wilkins. 2000. In the minds ear: The semantic extensions of perception verbs in Australian languages, Language 76/3: 546–587. Gibbs, Raymond W. Jr. 2006. Embodiment and Cognitive Science. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hewitt, George. 1979. Abkhaz. Lingua Descriptive Studies. North-Holland, Amsterdam. Heine, Bernd. 1997. Cognitive Foundations of Grammar. New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Heine, Bernd, Ulrike Claudi and Friederike Hünnemeyer. 1991a. From cognition to grammar: Evidence from African languages, in Elizabeth C. Traugott and Bernd Heine (eds.), Approaches to Grammaticalization. Volume 1: Focus on Theoretical and Methodological Issues. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. 149–187. ———. 1991b. Grammaticalization: A conceptual framework. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Heine, Bernd and Tania Kuteva. 2002. World lexicon of grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hilpert, Martin. 2006. Keeping an eye on the data: Metonymies and their patterns, in Anatol Stefanowitsch and Stefan Th. Gries (eds.) Corpus-Based Approaches to Metaphor and Metonymy. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 123–152.

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Johnson, Mark. 1987. The Body in the Mind: The Bodily Basis of Meaning, Imagination and Reason. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Kövecses, Zoltán. 2000. Metaphor and Emotion: Language, Culture and the Body in Human Feeling. Cambridge: Cambrigde University Press. ———. 2005. Metaphor in Culture: Universality and Variation. Cambridge: Cambrigde University Press. ———. 2010. Metaphor and culture, Acta Universitatis Sapientiae, Philologicai 2/2: 197–220. Kraska-Szlenk, Iwona. 2005. Metaphor and metonymy in the semantics of body parts: A contrastive analysis, in Elżbieta Górska and Günter Radden (ed.), MetonymyMetaphor Collage. Warszawa: Warsaw University Press. 157–175. Lakoff, George. 1987. Women, Fire and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal about the Mind. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Lakoff, George and Mark Johnson. 1980. Metaphors We Live By. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. ———. 1999. Philosophy in the Flesh: The embodied Mind and its Challenge to Western Thought. New York: Basic Books. Maalej, Zouheir and Ning Yu (eds.) 2011. Embodiment via Body Parts: Studies from Various Languages and Cultures. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. McPherron, Paul and Vaidehi Ramanathan 2011. Language, body, and health. (Language and Social Processes, 2.) Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Rohrer, Tim. 2007. Embodiment and experientalism, in Hubert Cuyckens and Dirk Geeraerts (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 25–47. Sharifian, Farzad. 2011. Cultural Conceptualisations and Language. Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Sharifian, Farzad, R. Dirven, N. Yu and S. Niemeier (eds.) 2008. Culture, Body, and Language: Conceptualizations of Internal Body Organs across Cultures and Languages. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Siahaan, Poppy. 2011. Head and eye in German and Indonesian figurative uses, in Maalej and Yu (eds.) Embodiment via Body Parts: Studies from Various Languages and Cultures. 93–113. Siakaluk, Paul D., Penny M. Pexman, Holly-Anne R. Dalrymple, Jodie Stearns and William J. Owen. 2011. Some insults are more difficult to ignore: The embodied insult Stroop effect, Language and Cognitive Processes 26/8: 1266–1294. Svorou, Soteria 1986. On the evolutionary paths of locative expressions, Berkeley Linguistics Society 12: 515–527. ——— 1993. The Grammar of Space. (Typological Studies in Language, 25.) Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Sweetser, Eve E. 1990. From Etymology to Pragmatics: Metaphorical and cultural Aspects of Semantic Structure. Cambridge.

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Traugott, Elizabeth Closs and Richard B. Dasher. 2002. Regularity in Semantic Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Traugott, Elizabeth C. and Bernd Heine (eds.). 1991. Approaches to Grammaticalization. Amsterdam: Benjamins (2 vols.) Ukosakul, Margaret. 2003. Conceptual metaphors motivating the use of Thai ‘face’, in Eugene H. Casad and Gary B. Palmer (eds.), Cognitive Linguistics and non-IndoEuropean Languages. Cognitive Linguistics Research 18. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 275–303. Viberg, Ake. 1984. The verbs of perception: a typological study, in: Butterworth, Brian & Comrie, Bernard & Osten Dahl (eds.) Explanations for language universals. Linguistics 21/1:123–162. Wierzbicka, Anna. 1999. Emotions across Languages and Cultures: Diversity and Universals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Yu, Ning. 2001. What does our face mean to us, Pragmatics and Cognition 9/1: 1–36. ———. 2009. From Body to Meaning in Culture: Papers on Cognitive Semantic Studies of Chinese. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Ziemke, Tom, Jordan Zlatev and Roslyn M. Frank (eds.) 2007. Body, language and mind. Vol. 1 Embodiment. Cognitive Linguistics Research 35.1. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter.

Grammaticalization and Lexicalization Patterns of Body Part Terms

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The Body in Language: Observations from Grammaticalization Bernd Heine Abstract The relationship between language and the (human) body has been approached from a wide range of angles. Using grammaticalization theory as a framework, the concern of the present paper is with patterns of cognitive transfer as they can be reconstructed on the basis of linguistic analysis. The paper is comparative and diachronic in nature, drawing on crosslinguistic generalizations for reconstruction.

1 Introduction That there is a general relationship between the conceptualization of the human body and language structure has been argued in a number of different works based on a variety of different approaches. One line of research focuses on the ways in which language shapes and gives visibility to embodied experience, how different states in physical strength and health are conceptualized, etc. (e.g. the contributions in McPherron and Ramanathan 2011). The concern of this paper is more generally with patterns of cognitive transfer whereby the use of a term for a body part is extended to also express concepts belonging to other domains of human experience. The process concerned is creative in nature. Creativity means that old materials are combined in novel, unconventional ways where the resulting combination comes to be accepted by the community (Heine and Stolz 2008). A paradigm example of creativity, one that will figure prominently in this paper, is of the following kind. Body parts are typically animate concepts, being inalienable components of living human or animal organisms. Accordingly, combining these concepts with inanimate possessor nouns constitutes an unconventional process that results in the creation of new concepts. Hence, the first English speakers to have combined the bodypart noun neck with the noun bottle to create a new term, bottleneck, or mouth and river to create the expression mouth of river for a new concept were responsible for creative acts resulting in an enrichment of the lexical and constructional inventory available to speakers of the English language.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi ��.��63/9789004274297_��3

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The approach adopted in this paper is diachronic and typological in nature. By applying grammaticalization theory it aims at reconstructing regularities in the evolution of conceptual transfer across languages (e.g. Heine 2003). This means that the hypotheses proposed can be verified or falsified on the basis of historical evidence. For example, the claim that there was a historical process from neck as a body-part term to bottleneck as a compound noun, rather than the other way round, is based on the hypothesis that the use of the body-part term neck is older in the history of English than that of bottleneck and that the former was involved in some way in the creation of the latter. The linguistic outcomes of such creative acts can be of different kinds. Perhaps most commonly, it takes the form of a compound, as in bottleneck, of a phrase, as in mouth of river, or of a fixed collocation of words, such as an idiomatic expression, e.g., to bring to a head. But it may also give rise to new grammatical constructions, as we will see below. I shall restrict myself here to a discussion of linguistic expressions, and more narrowly to spoken or written expressions. This means, first, that signed expressions are not considered (but see Pfau and Steinbach 2006 for similar processes in signed languages) and, second, that “paralinguistic” information units, most of all gestures, must also be ignored. In doing so, I am aware that this restriction is in some ways questionable, most of all for the following reasons. First, there are good reasons to argue that gestures form, at least to some extent, an integral constituent of speech. For example, the use of a demonstrative pronoun to express a direction invariably entails the use of a pointing gesture in many societies. Second, some gestures are semantically largely equivalent to corresponding linguistic units. For example, the meaning of ‘yes’ may be expressed in English by the linguistic item yes, but a nodding gesture can in many contexts be considered to be an appropriate paralinguistic equivalent, and instead of the item no, negation can frequently be expressed by shaking one’s head. And third, there are a number of linguistic expressions that appear to be descriptions derived from gestures, e.g. He nodded or She raised her eyebrow. The paper is organized as follows. Section 2 provides a brief overview of the methodology employed. Section 3 forms the main part of the paper, dealing with three paradigm domains of transfers involving body parts and giving rise to new grammatical forms and categories, namely spatial orientation (3.1), reference identity (3.2), and numerals (3.3). Finally, in Section 4, some conclusions are drawn.

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Conceptual Strategies and Grammaticalization

2.1 Conceptual Transfer Transfer patterns of the kind discussed in this paper are described conveniently in terms of two cognitive strategies, or figures of speech, namely metonymy and metaphor (Heine et al. 1991; Heine 1997). The former concerns conceptual contiguity, where an expression that normally designates one entity, called the source or vehicle, provides mental access to, or is used instead to designate another, associated entity, the target (Langacker (2000: 201; Kövecses 2002). Thus, in the well-known example (1) of Lakoff and Johnson (1980: 35), the referent the ham sandwich is conceptualized as the metonymic vehicle that gives mental access to the target, that is, the person who had ordered the ham sandwich: (1) The ham sandwich is waiting for his check.

Metaphor, by contrast, is best described in terms of a conjunction of the following properties: (a) There is a transfer from one domain of conceptualization to another, (b) the transfer is not formally marked, and (c) there is a predication that is, if taken literally, false. Thus, in the following example from the East Cushitic language Oromo of northeastern Africa, the noun fuula has its literal meaning of ‘face’ in (2a). In (2b), by contrast, it has the metaphorical meaning ‘front page’. As Amante (2011) shows, the two meanings belong to different domains, namely ‘face’ to that of animate concepts and ‘front page’ to that of inanimate concepts. (2b) is based on a metaphorical transfer from the former to the latter domain, and this transfer is not formally marked. If fuula were understood in its literal meaning in (2b) the utterance would be “false” since books do not normally have faces. (2) Oromo (East Cushitic, Nilo-Saharan; Amante 2011) a fuula sanga-a face ox-GEN ‘face of the ox’ b fuula kitaaba-a face book-GEN ‘front page of a book’

Metonymy and metaphor provide convenient tools to account for the transfer patterns that are the subject of this paper. The way and the extent to which they

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are actually involved in these processes is an issue that is still ill-understood. As we argue here, following Heine et al. (1991), the two are by no means mutually exclusive in grammaticalization processes; rather, the two may jointly contribute to the rise of new grammatical categories. 2.2 Grammaticalization Grammaticalization is defined as the development from lexical to grammatical forms, and from grammatical to even more grammatical forms. Since the development of grammatical forms is not independent of the constructions to which they belong, the study of grammaticalization is in the same way concerned with constructions, and with even larger discourse segments (see e.g. Traugott and Heine 1991a; 1991b; Heine et al. 1991; Bybee et al. 1994; Lehmann [1982] 1995; Heine and Kuteva 2002; Hopper and Traugott 2003). In accordance with this definition, grammaticalization theory is concerned with the genesis and/or development of grammatical forms. Its primary goal is to describe how grammatical forms and constructions arise and develop through space and time, and to explain why they are structured the way they are. One main motivation for grammaticalization consists in using linguistic forms for meanings that are concrete, easily accessible and/or clearly delineated to also express less concrete, less easily accessible and less clearly delineated meaning contents. To this end, lexical or less grammaticalized linguistic expressions are pressed into service for the expression of more grammatical functions; we will return to this issue in Section 3. In order to identify processes of grammaticalization, a wide range of criteria have been proposed (see e.g. Hopper 1991; Lehmann [1982] 1995; Heine and Kuteva 2002; Hopper and Traugott 2003). In our model it is the four parameters listed in (3) which, as we argue, take care of most of the relevant criteria that have been proposed in other frameworks. Henceforth we will rely on these parameters, using them as a tool for identifying instances of grammaticalization. (3) Parameters of grammaticalization a Extension: linguistic expressions are extended to new contexts that invite the rise of grammatical functions (context-induced reinterpretation), b desemanticization (or “semantic bleaching”): loss (or generalization) of meaning content, c decategorialization: loss of morphosyntactic properties characteristic of ­lexical or other less grammaticalized forms, and d erosion (“phonetic reduction”): loss of phonetic substance.

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Each of these parameters concerns a different aspect of language structure or language use; (3a) is pragmatic in nature, (3b) relates to semantics, (3c) to morphosyntax, and (3d) to phonetics. Except for (3a), these parameters all involve loss of properties. But the process cannot be reduced to one of structural “degeneration”. There are also gains: in the same way as linguistic items undergoing grammaticalization lose in semantic, morphosyntactic and phonetic substance, they also gain in properties characteristic of their uses in new contexts—to the extent that in some cases their meaning and syntactic functions may show little resemblance to their original use. The ordering of these parameters reflects the diachronic sequence in which they typically apply: grammaticalization tends to start out with extension, which triggers desemanticization, and subsequently decategorialization and erosion. Erosion is the last parameter to come in when grammaticalization takes place, and in many of the examples to be presented below it is not (or not yet) involved. Paradigm instances of grammaticalization involve all four paramaters but, as we will see below, there are also cases where not all of the parameters play a role. 3

The Main Pools of Conceptual Transfer Provided by the Human Body

The human body provides one of the most salient models for understanding, describing, and denoting concepts that are more difficult to understand, describe, and denote. Our interest in this section is restricted to grammatical denotation and the role played by body parts in creating new grammatical forms and categories. It is most of all the following grammatical domains that appear to draw on this model: (a) Spatial orientation (b) Reference identity (reflexivity) (c) Counting We will now look at each of these domains in turn. 3.1 Spatial Orientation The relevance of the body-part model for structuring the space of deictic location (and time) has been described in detail in works on grammaticalization based on crosscultural comparison (e.g., Svorou 1986; 1994; Brugman and Macaulay 1986; Heine et al. 1991; Bowden 1992; Heine 1997). The reader is

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referred to these works for more details; we are confined here to highlighting a few observations that are relevant to the subject matter of this paper. There is a crosslinguistically common process of grammaticalization whereby body part noun phrases (or adverbial phrases) forming the head of a possessive/genitive construction develop into adpositions, and in some languages this is even the primary source for adpositions. Underlying this grammaticalization process is a conceptual-semantic process whereby concrete, lexical concepts are pressed into service for the expression of more abstract, schematic functions of space, time, cause, purpose, etc. (see Heine 1997). This process is in accordance with the parameters of grammaticalization distinguished in (3) above. Desemanticization has the effect of bleaching out the lexical meaning of the body-part noun, resulting in a schematic, grammatical function. Decategorialization leads to the loss of categorial properties of the head noun, such as the ability to be inflected, to be pluralized, to take nominal determiners or modifiers, to be replaced by other nouns or a corresponding possessive pronoun, or to occur without a dependent noun phrase. Erosion may also occur, leading to a phonetic reduction of the adpositions. We may illustrate this with an example from the Chadic language Hausa of Northern Nigeria (cf. Newman 2000: 470–1). The Hausa noun jìkī# ‘body’ has been recruited to serve as a preposition meaning ‘against, embedded in’. Being a relational noun, it requires the linker -n to be connected with its possessor noun or possessive pronoun (hence, jìkin). Since the old, lexical meaning has been retained, there is now ambiguity between the lexical ‘body’ meaning in (4a) and the prepositional meaning in (4b). (4) Hausa (Afroasiatic, Chadic; Newman 2000: 470–1) jìkin-sà body-3.SG.M.POSS a ‘his body’ b ‘against, embedded in him’

That this was not an isolated process in the history of Hausa can be seen in (Table 1). There is an entire set of body-part nouns that appear to have undergone a similar process of grammaticalization in accordance with the parameters of (3). The use of the noun was extended to contexts where the lexical meaning no longer made sense (extension); hence, that meaning was lost in the prepositional use (desemanticization), and the preposition lost salient features of a noun, such as taking a plural marker or a modifier (decategorialization). It is only the last parameter, namely erosion, that does not apply. Note that phonetic reduction takes a longer time to materialize; accordingly,

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it tends to occur only after desemanticization and decategorialization have taken place. Table 1

Some body-part sources of genitive prepositions in Hausa (Afroasiatic, Chadic; Newman 2000: 470–1)

Lexical source

Meaning

Preposition

Meaning

bā� kī bāya gṑshī jìkī kâi

‘mouth’ ‘(at the) back’ ‘forehead’ ‘body’ ‘head’

bā� kin bāyan gṑshin jìkin kân

‘at the edge/side of’ ‘after, behind’ ‘just prior to’ ‘against, embedded in’ ‘on top of’

Hausa has the word order possessee—possessor, and since body-part nouns have the function of a possessee, the outcome is that Hausa acquired prepositions via grammaticalization. Accordingly, in languages that place the possessor before the possessee noun phrase, the erstwhile body part nouns are likely to end up as postpositions. This can be shown with the following example (5) from the Dhaasanac language of southwestern Ethiopia and northern Kenya where postpositions like ˀaf ‘in front of’ in (5a) appear to be built on an earlier syntactic pattern dependent—head, as it occurs in compounds, such as (5b).1 That this is not an isolated case of a transfer from body-part noun to postposition can be seen in the examples of (Table 2). (5) Dhaasanac (East Cushitic, Afroasiatic; Tosco 2001: 240–4, 255) a kúo ɓíl Ɂaf taalli? 2.SG.S house mouth stand.PERF ‘Were you (standing) in front of the house?’ b gíl luuti hand neck ‘wrist’ (lit. ‘hand’s neck’)

1 Dhaasanach also has a second possessee—possessor word order pattern (Tosco 2001: 254).

20 Table 2

Heine Body-part sources of postpositions in Dhaasanac (East Cushitic, Afroasiatic; Tosco 2001: 240–4)

Lexical source

Meaning

Postposition

Meaning

Ɂafu bál Ɂél géere Ɂinnu mé sugu tóomo

‘mouth’ ‘chest’ ‘back’ ‘belly’ ‘eyes’ ‘head’ ‘back’ ‘waist’

Ɂafu bál Ɂél géere Ɂinnu mé sugu tóomo

‘in front of’ ‘next to’ ‘behind, back’ ‘inside’ ‘around, amidst, between’ ‘in front of’ ‘behind’ ‘between’

On the surface, the process from body part to spatial meaning has the appearance of a metaphorical transfer, whereby objects from the domain of physical experience are taken as vehicles to understand and/or express concepts of the domain of space. All observations available suggest, however, that the process is more complex in that it tends to involve an intermediate step of metonymic extension (Heine et al. 1991: 70–6). 3.2 Reference Identity A survey of reflexive constructions in the languages of the world suggests that one of the main pathways leading to the rise of reflexive markers is provided by ‘body’- or ‘body part’-nouns (Heine 2000; Schladt 2000); Table 3 provides an overview of such languages. Table 3

Nominal sources of reflexive markers across the world (Sample: 89 languages; Schladt 2000: 112)

Nominal source

Frequency

Percentage

‘body’ ‘head’ Other body parts Total

71 13 5 89

79.8 % 14.6 % 5.6 % 100 %

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Table 3 suggests that by far the most common nominal meaning to encode reflexive concepts crosslinguistically is to use the noun ‘body’ as the object noun in a propositional schema of the kind ‘X sees/hits/kills X’s body’, and this schema is then grammaticalized to a reflexive proposition. Thus, in the following example from the Nigerian language Efik, the item ídém forms a lexical noun for ‘body’ in (6a) but part of a grammatical marker for reflexivity in (6b). (6) Efik (Benue-Congo, Niger-Congo; Essien 1982) a Árìt éyě ídém. Arit has body ‘Arit has a beautiful body.’ b Árìt óyòm ńdíwòt ídém ésiě. Arit want kill body her ‘Arit wants to kill herself.’

Compared to languages using that schema, that is, languages that have grammaticalized their noun for ‘body’ to a reflexive pronoun, the number of languages using other body parts is fairly small. While ‘head’ forms a significant minority, other nouns are rarely found, such nouns being ‘skin’, ‘scull’, ‘heart’, ‘soul’, etc.; in the Gurduŋ language of northern Nigeria, it appears to be the noun àni (or àaŋ) ‘hand’ which has grammaticalized into both an intensifier and a reflexive marker:2 (7) Gurduŋ (Western Chadic, Afroasiatic; Haruna 2003: 62) ti gyù àni sì. he beat hand his ‘He beat himself.’

The process from body-part noun to reflexive marker shows all the features of a canonical process of grammaticalization: The use of the noun is extended to contexts where the body-part meaning does not make sense or is ruled out (extension), and in such a context the new meaning surfaces: instead of standing for the body (or a part of it) as a physical entity, the form now stands for the person as a whole. And since the latter is referentially identical with a preceding referent, which almost invariably is the sentence subject, the meaning of reflexivity emerges. The body or body-part meaning thus no longer makes sense and is eventually bleached out (desemanticization). 2 In the first person singular, the noun gaŋ ‘head’ is used instead (Haruna 2003: 60).

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As is always the case in grammaticalization, the process is gradual and involves overlaps between the earlier and the later stage. In the Logba language of southeastern Ghana, the noun i-yó ‘skin, body’ has been firmly grammaticalized to a reflexive marker, cf. (8a). Still, the literal meaning does not appear to be lost entirely. When a specific body part is concerned, the noun denoting that body part is preferred to the reflexive marker, cf. (8b). (8) Logba (Kwa, Niger-Congo; Dorvlo 2008 220) a gu i-yó wash NC-body ‘wash body, wash oneself’ b gba i-dzi shave NC-beard ‘shave beard’

This process entails that the erstwhile body (part) noun, no longer having lexical meaning, loses categorial morphological and syntactic properties of a noun (decategorialization). Decategorialization also means that the erstwhile noun may no longer occur in all the syntactic slots reserved for nouns. For example, in the Yoruba language of southwestern Nigeria, object complements can be front-shifted, and this is also possible with the noun ara ‘body’ when used in its nominal meaning. But in its desemanticized meaning as a reflexive marker, as in (9a), ara can no longer be front-shifted like nouns, that is, (9b) is not well-formed. (9) Yoruba (Kwa, Niger-Congo; Awolaye 1986: 4) a Nwosu rí ara rɛ. Nwosu saw body his ‘Nwosu saw himself.’ b *ara rɛ rí Nwosu. body his saw Nwosu *‘Nwosu saw himself.’

On the other hand, decategorialization means loss of the ability to take inflectional or derivational material associated with nouns. For example, in Koyra Chiini of Mali the noun bomo ‘head’ has been grammaticalized to a “compound reflexive” and in this capacity does not take the nominal plural morpheme yo:

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(10) Koyra Chiini (Songhai, Nilo-Saharan; Heath 1999: 329–31): yer ta bine nda [yer tun [nda [yer bomo]]] kul, [. . .]. 1.PL TOP TOP if 1.PL.S arise with 1.PL head all [. . .] ‘As for us, if we get up by ourselves, [. . .].’

Decategorialization may also mean that the erstwhile noun (phrase) loses its independent status and becomes increasingly dependent on the verb, and it may develop into a clitic, or even an affix. For example, in the Kordofanian language Krongo, the noun òonó ‘body’ does not take a possessive modifier and can optionally be attached to the verb as a suffix when used as a reflexive or middle marker but not as a noun (Reh 1985: 15). Finally, loss of meaning and morphosyntactic status are likely to trigger loss in phonetic substance (erosion). The reflexive marker tends to become shorter and/or lose phonetic complexity. Erosion may be phonetic, in that the linguistic expression loses some of its phonetic substance or properties, as in the following example, where a phonetically complex consonantal onset appears to have been simplified on the way from noun to reflexive suffix: (11) Lamang (Chadic, Afroasiatic; Wolff 1983: 120–2) ghvà ‘body’, reflexive -và verbal reflexive or middle suffix

But it may as well involve morphological material. For example, in the Nigerian language Ibibio the noun ídém ‘body’ takes a possessive modifier, e.g., idem ámᴐ̀ (body his) ‘his body’ in (12a). However, in the grammaticalized use of this noun as a reflexive marker, the use of the possessive modifier is optional, cf. (12b): (12) Ibibio (Niger-Congo; Essien 1982: 96ff.) a idem ámɔ̀ body his ‘his body’ b ányààŋà idem (ámɔ̀ ). he.is.helping body his ‘He’s helping himself.’

The processes just sketched on the development from body-part noun (phrase) to reflexive marker can presumably be observed in well over one hundred African languages but I have not come across a single instance where a process in the opposite direction has been observed (Heine 2000).

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3.3 Number A conceptual domain that tends to be less commonly associated with the human body is that of numerals in general and counting in particular. Our interest here is exclusively with conceptual transfer patterns from the human hands to numerical concepts and the effects that these patterns have on the structuring of cardinal numerals. That the hands and the fingers, and at times also various other body parts, are central tools for counting number values or objects is well known and has been described in detail across cultures. In addition, however, hands and fingers, and to some extent also feet, have been recruited in various societies to create linguistic expressions for numerals. It is especially numerals between ‘6’ and ‘9’ that tend to be expressed by means of grammatical forms involving fingers. A paradigm example is provided by the Bantu language Zulu of South Africa, which uses the expressions in (13) for these numeral concepts, apparently derived from modes of counting: (13) Some numerals of Zulu (Bantu, Niger-Congo; Doke [1927] 1988: 326)

isithupha (lit. ‘the thumb’) isikhombisa (lit. ‘the index finger’) isishiyagalombili (lit. ‘the leaving behind two fingers’) isishiyagalolunye (lit. ‘the leaving behind one finger’)

‘6’ ‘7’ ‘8’ ‘9’

But of particular interest for our hypothesis that the human body provides one of the most salient cognitive templates for structuring grammatical categories is the following observation (see Heine 1997: 18–34; Heine 2004: 107–10): Crosslinguistically, the numeral for ‘5’ constitutes the smallest recurrent base number, that is, the numeral value from which counting starts over. And conceivably the most common linguistic source for the numeral expression of ‘5’ is provided by the body-part term for ‘hand’. Furthermore, in a number of languages, numerals for ‘10’ are derived etymologically from expressions meaning ‘both hands’. The word for ‘5’ can be the same as the word for ‘hand’, but it may also be more complex, consisting of a descriptive predication, as it does in the !Xun language (E2 dialect) of Namibia, cf. (14a).3 And much the same applies to words for ‘10’, as (14b) shows:

3 !Xun (or Ju) was formerly classified as Northern Khoisan (Greenberg 1963).

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(14) !Xun (E2 dialect, Kx’a family; Heine and König forthc.) a !hūn-!áú or !áú !áí ‘5’ kill-hand hand die (“It kills the hand”) (“the hand dies”) b !hūn !áú tè !hūn !áú tè kā ‘10’ kill hand and kill hand and join (“It kills one hand and the other hand, and they join”)

These observations would seem to suggest the following: First, in seeking terms for numerals, speakers across the world tend to rely on their bodily extremities for linguistic expression. Second, the human hands provide a distinctly more widespread conceptual template than the feet. There are many languages where it is only a term for ‘hand’ that figures in numeral expressions while I am not aware of any language where ‘foot’ or ‘toe’ but not ‘hand’ or ‘finger’ occur in numerals. Almost invariably, the feet are recruited as templates only when the hands are exhausted, that is, when numeral values higher than ‘10’ are involved. This shift from hands to feet can be illustrated with the examples in (15a) from the Nilo-Saharan language Mamvu of the Republic of Congo. Numerals for ‘20’ can be traced back in some languages from linguistic forms meaning literally ‘hands and feet’ or ‘a whole person’ (i.e. ‘all hands and feet of a person’), as in (15b). (15) Mamvu (Central Sudanic, Nilo-Saharan; Vorbichler 1971: 231–2) a elí ɓòsí relí (‘hand all one’) ‘10’ qarú qodè relí (‘foot seizes one’) ‘11’ qarú qodè juè (‘foot seizes two’) ‘12’ b múdo ngburú relí (‘person whole one’) ‘20’ múdo ngburú juè (‘person whole two’) ‘30’

Third, these observations can be related to another typological observation. In the languages of the world, numeral systems having ‘5’ (i.e., quinary systems), ‘10’ (decimal systems), or ‘20’ (vigesimal systems) as their numeral base are statistically predominant (Heine 2004: 108; 1997) and among these decimal systems are the most widespread. This suggests the following hypothesis: In view of the predominance of numeral systems having ‘five’ as a base as well as the fact that the human hands and feet have five digits each, it seems reasonable to assume that it was physical features of the human body that must have played a role in structuring the shape of many numeral systems, accounting for the fact that many languages have ‘5’, ‘10’, or ‘20’, but hardly any that have ‘4’ or ‘7’

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as their numeral base. Note, however, that in the majority of the languages of the world, numerals are etymologically opaque; hence, such languages do not provide appropriate empirical evidence to test this hypothesis. And fourth, our observations also concern grammaticalization. In many languages, numerals form a category of their own, typically having the properties of nominal qualifiers such as quantifiers (‘many’, ‘all’) or adjectives (‘big’, ‘red’). Body parts like hands and feet are usually encoded linguistically as nouns. Now, when in a given language a noun like ‘hand’ is recruited for creating a numeral for ‘five’ this then means that grammaticalization takes place, in accordance with the parameters distinguished in (3) of Section 2.2. This means that the lexical body-part meaning is lost (desemanticization), the item can no longer be modified or inflected like nouns (decategorialization), and the item may also undergo phonetic reduction (erosion). In the end, the item may turn into an invariable form that is no longer conceived by speakers as being related to the body-part term from which it is derived. For example, in the Papuan language Manambu of the Ndu family, the numeral taba:b ‘10’ is historically derived from the root ta:b- ‘hand’ plus a formative -a:b, the origin of which is not entirely clear (it could be cognate to either -a:b ‘too’ or aba:b ‘all’ (Aikhenvald 2008: 234–5). The formative is absent in the numeral for ‘10’, of which the historical meaning appears to be ‘two hands’: (16) Manambu (Ndu; Aikhenvald 2008: 235) tabəti or tabati (< ta:b ‘hand’ + viti ‘two’)

‘10’

In conclusion, mention should be made that we are confined here to one pathway of grammatical change, namely one leading from nominal forms to grammatical forms typically used as nominal modifiers. But it is not only nominal expressions that give rise to numerals. As we saw above, forms for numerals above ‘6’ are often derived from more complex expressions. For example, the Mamvu expression qarú qodè relí (‘foot seizes one’) for ‘11’ can be traced back to a proposition having the structure of a transitive clause. Accordingly, rather than nominal structures, the grammaticalization of such expressions involves clausal structures. 3.4 Transfers Not Involving Grammaticalization Body parts are visible and tangible objects that are always available to speakers in day-to-day communication. As such, they provide an ideal template for understanding and expressing concepts that are non-visible and non-tangible. In the grammaticalization processes sketched in the preceding sections this

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potential is exploited for creating grammatical categories serving the expression of spatial and temporal relations, of reference identity, and of numerals. But grammaticalization constitutes only one of the directions in which this potential is exploited, and in concluding Section 3 we wish to draw attention to the main alternative directions. One of these directions concerns dynamic situations. Certain body parts tend to be associated with specific human activities. The cognitive process concerned appears to be one where the use of the body-part term is extended metonymically to express an activity typically carried out by or involving the relevant body part. The result is that in some languages the use of nouns is extended to express activities crucially involving the body part concerned. Since activities are as a rule encoded as verbs, this usually requires a process of linguistic derivation whereby nouns are verbalized. Body parts perhaps most commonly recruited are the hand, the head, the knee, the tongue, and the foot. A few examples from English may illustrate the outcome of the process, cf. (4). (17) Examples of English verbs a ‘eye’: to eye b ‘hand’: to hand, to hand down/in/on/out/over, to handle c ‘head’: to head, to head back/for/in/into/off, etc. d ‘knee’: to kneel f ‘shoulder’: to shoulder

Furthermore, certain body parts tend to be conceived as standing for or contributing towards the expression of abstract concepts. Body-part terms for ‘hand’, for example, are crosslinguistically commonly used for signaling ‘possession’ or ‘control’, cf. English to have things firmly in hand, It’s out of our hands now. The body part ‘brain’, by contrast, tends to be recruited for expressing intellectual capability (e.g., He has brains), while the lack of certain body parts, such as ‘guts’, ‘balls’, or ‘stomach’, can be metaphorically exploited to express negatively valued human properties, cf. He has no guts. Another conceptual domain that may exploit body-part terms is that of social relations. Stereotypic analogy based on hypothesized values of specific body parts can have the effect that terms for the body part concerned are extended metonymically and/or metaphorically to refer to persons assumed to exhibit specific characteristics of behavior, cf. English sweetheart, asshole. But presumably the most common transfer pattern is provided by the metonymic and/or metaphorical conceptualization of body parts as the seat of emotions. I am not aware of any linguistic community that has not exploited

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this pattern at least to some extent (see e.g. the contributions in Enfield and Wierzbicka 2002; Kövecses 2000). It is for the most part internal parts of the human body that are the hypothesized centers of and provide the metonymic or metaphorical vehicle for the expression of emotions and human character. Crosslinguistically, a number of centers are distinguished, but the following are among the ones most commonly highlighted: ‘heart’ (cf. English, bleeding heart, heart-breaking, heart-melting, heart-rending, heart-touching, heart-warming, etc.), ‘head’ (headless, heady, thick-headed, etc.), ‘liver’, ‘bile’, ‘stomach’, and ‘intestines’. There are considerable cultural differences in the way that these concepts figure in conceptual transfers; for example, much of the emotional behavior attributed in Europe to the heart is located in the belly or stomach in many African cultures. The processes discussed in Section 3 have in common with the processes discussed earlier the fact that in most cases they lead from concrete concepts for visible and tangible objects to linguistic expressions for less concrete concepts. What distinguishes the processes discussed in Section 3.4 from the ones discussed earlier is that they do not result in new grammatical categories such as adpositions, pronouns or nominal modifiers but rather end up in regular collocations of words, best described as idioms and other kinds of prefabs (Erman and Warren 2000). 4 Conclusions The processes discussed in this paper are reconstructed on the basis of observations on recurrent conceptualizations as they surface in specific linguistic patternings, most of all in polysemy and heterosemy patterns. This means that our findings are diachronic in nature and can be verified or falsified by means of historical analysis. Table 4 provides an overview of the body parts primarily involved in conceptualization. The listings, which are based on a preliminary crosslinguistic survey, suggest that there are certain preferences in the choice of body parts. In the choice of terms for spatial orientation, for example, ‘back’ and ‘eye’ or ‘face’ are prominent body parts, whereas ‘nose’ or ‘ear’ are, perhaps surprisingly, relatively insignificant as conceptual vehicles in the languages of the world.

The Body in Language: Observations from Grammaticalization Table 4

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The main pools of conceptual transfer provided by the human body

Target concepts

Main body part concepts recruited

Spatial orientation Reference identity Number Dynamic situations Social relations Emotions

(a) back, (b) head, (c) eye/face, (d) belly, (e) heart (a) body, (b) head (a) hands, (b) fingers (a) hand, (b) head, (c) knee, (d) tongue, (e) foot (a) heart, (b) head heart, stomach, head, liver, bile, intestines/guts

The findings presented suggest that language structure is motivated rather than being arbitrary; it is one of the products of human behavior. We were restricted to one small part of that behavior, whereby old linguistic material is deployed for use in new contexts to create novel meanings and, via grammaticalization, also new grammatical forms. To be sure, these forms are as a rule not entirely new; rather, as a rule they are added as new members to existing lexical and grammatical paradigms. Typical products of such processes are listed in Table 5. Table 5

Conceptual transfer of body part terms and resulting linguistic forms

Target concepts

Main linguistic products

Spatial orientation Reference identity Number Dynamic situations Social relations Emotions

adverbs, adpositions, case markers reflexive markers numerals verbs, idiomatic collocations nouns, idiomatic collocations prefabs, idiomatic collocations

Acknowledgements I wish to thank Matthias Brenzinger, Iwona Kraska-Szlenk, and Jon Orman for their assistance and valuable comments on an earlier version of this paper.

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Abbreviations GEN = genitive; M = masculine; NC = noun class marker; POSS = possessive; S = subject; SG = singular; 1, 2, 3 = first, second, third person.

References Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y. 2008. The Manambu Language of East Sepik, Papua New Guinea. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Amante, Debela Goshu 2011. The semantics of Oromo frontal adpositions. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Oslo, Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies. Awolaye, Yiwola 1986. Reflexivization in Kwa languages. In Gerrit Dimmendaal (ed.), Current approaches to African linguistics. Volume 3. Dordrecht and Cinnaminson: Foris Publications. Pp. 1–14. Bowden, John 1992. Behind the preposition: Gramma­ ticalization of locatives in Oceanic languages. (Pacific Linguistics Series B, 107.) Canberra: Australian National University. Brugman, Claudia and Monica Macaulay 1986. Interacting semantic systems: Mixtec expressions of location. Berkeley Linguistics Society 12: 315–27. Bybee, Joan L., Revere D. Perkins and William Pagliuca 1994. The evolution of grammar: Tense, Aspect and Modality in the Languages of the World. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Doke, Clement M. [1927] 1988. Textbook of Zulu grammar. Sixth edition. Cape Town: Maskew Miller Longman. Dorvlo, Kofi 2008. A grammar of Logba. Ph.D. dissertation, Leiden University. Enfield, N. J. and Anna Wierzbicka (eds.) 2002. The body in description of emotion: Cross-linguistic studies. Special issue of Pragmatics & Cognition 10, 1/2 (2002). Erman, Britt and Beatrice Warren 2000. The idiom principle and the open choice principle. Text 20: 29–62. Essien, Okon E. 1982. The so-called reflexive pronouns and reflexivization in Ibibio. Studies in African Linguistics 13, 2: 93–108. Greenberg, Joseph H. 1963. The languages of Africa. The Hague: Mouton Haruna, Andrew 2003. A grammatical outline of Gùrdùŋ /Gùrùntùm (Southern Bauchi, Nigeria). (Westafrikanische Studien, 25.) Cologne: Rüdiger Köppe. Heath, Jeffrey 1999. A grammar of Koyra Chiini: the Songhay of Timbuktu. (Mouton Grammar Library, 19.) Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Heine, Bernd 1997. Cognitive foundations of grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ——— 2000. Polysemy involving reflexive and reciprocal markers in African languages. In Frajzyngier, Zygmunt and Traci S. Curl (eds.) 2000. Reciprocals: Forms and

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functions. (Typological Studies in Language, 41.) Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Ben­ jamins. Pp. 1–29. ——— 2003. Grammaticalization. In Joseph, Brian D. & Richard D. Janda (eds.) 2003, The handbook of historical linguistics. Oxford: Blackwell. Pp. 575–601. ——— 2004. On genetic motivation in grammar. In Günter Radden and Klaus Panther (eds.) 2004, Studies in linguistic motivation. (Cognitive Linguistics Research, 28.) New York, Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Pp. 103–120. Heine, Bernd, Ulrike Claudi & Friederike Hünnemeyer 1991. Grammaticalization: a conceptual framework. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Heine, Bernd and Christa König forthc. The !Xun language: a dialect grammar. (Quellen zur Khoisan-Forschung.) Cologne: Köppe. Heine, Bernd and Tania Kuteva 2002. World lexicon of grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Heine, Bernd and Thomas Stolz 2008. Grammaticalization as a creative process. Sprachtypologie und Universalienforschung (STUF) 61, 4: 326–57. Hopper, Paul J. 1991. On some principles of grammaticization. In Traugott and Heine 1991a. Pp. 17–35. Hopper, Paul J. and Elizabeth C. Traugott 2003. Grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kövecses, Zoltán 2000. Metaphor and emotion: Language, culture, and body in human feeling. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ——— 2002. Metaphor: A Practical Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Lakoff, George and Mark Johnson 1980. Metaphors we live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Langacker, Ronald W. 2000. Grammar and conceptualization. Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Lehmann, Christian [1982] 1995. Thoughts on Grammaticalization. 2nd, revised edition Munich: LINCOM EUROPA. McPherron, Paul and Vaidehi Ramanathan 2011. Language, body, and health. (Language and Social Processes, 2.) Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Newman, Paul 2000. The Hausa language: an encyclopedic reference grammar. New Haven, London: Yale University Press. Pfau, Roland and Markus Steinbach 2006. Modality-independent and modalityspecific aspects of grammaticalization in sign languages. Linguistics in Potsdam 24: 5–98. Reh, Mechthild 1985. Die Krongo-Sprache (niino mo-di). Beschreibung, Texte, Wörterverzeichnis. (Kölner Beiträge zur Afrikanistik, 12.) Berlin: Dietrich Reimer. Schladt, Mathias 2000. The typology and grammaticalization of reflexives. In Frajzyngier, Zygmunt and Traci S. Curl (eds.) 2000. Reflexives: Forms and functions.

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(Typological Studies in Language, 40.) Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Pp. 103–24. Svorou, Soteria 1986. On the evolutionary paths of locative expressions. Berkeley Linguistics Society 12: 515–527. ——— 1994. The grammar of space. (Typological Studies in Language, 25.) Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Tosco, Mauro 2001. The Dhaasanac Language. Cologne: Köppe. Traugott, Elizabeth C. and Bernd Heine (eds.) 1991a. Approaches to grammaticalization. Volume 1. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. ——— 1991b. Approaches to grammaticalization. Volume 2. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins. Vorbichler, Anton 1971. Die Sprache der Mamvu. (Afrikanistische Forschungen, 5.) Glückstadt: Augustin. Wolff, Ekkehard 1983. A grammar of the Lamang language (Gwàd LàmàN). (Afrikani­ stische Forschungen, 10.) Glückstadt: J. J. Augustin.

Grammaticalization of Body-Part Terms in Ethiosemitic Abinet Sime Gebreyes Abstract The main objective of this paper is identifying the possible instances of the processes of grammaticalization of body part terms in more than ten Ethiosemitic languages. Some of the body part terms found relevant are words for ‘head’, ‘face’, ‘foot’, ‘sole’, ‘hand’, ‘stomach’, ‘back of the body’, ‘buttocks’, ‘rib’, and ‘soul’. These terms were found grammaticalizing into pronouns, adverbs, adpositional and circumpositional case markers, and further into circumpositional clausal subordinators. The grammaticalization paths taken could also be mentioned in this fashion: (body part) OBJECT > LOCATIVE > TEMPORAL > CONDITIONAL, CAUSAL, and ADVERSATIVE. Some of the instances seem to be peculiar: the Amharic preposition wädä ‘to’ (ALLATIVE) which derives from the word for ‘hand’; the third person pronouns which derive from the words for ‘stomach’ (Argobba), ‘soul’ (Tigrinya), and ‘head’ (Amharic). With such peculiar instances and its focus on the genetic distribution of the grammaticalization of body part terms in a single family of languages, this study will likely be a contribution to grammaticalization studies of the topic under discussion.

1 Introduction Grammatical morphemes (grams) evolve from lexical morphemes (lexemes). A grammaticalizing morpheme shifts from a category with large membership to a category with smaller and smaller membership; it becomes more and more schematic in meaning and shorter in length; and it also tends to be polyfunctional. This process of language change is termed grammaticalization. Grammaticalization studies, therefore, has its focus on the origin and evolution of grammatical categories (cf. Heine et al. 1991, Heine 1997, among many others). Body-part nouns rate among the most common inputs for grammaticalization. In their World-Lexicon, Heine and Kuteva have included about 16 body-part terms as source concepts in their discussion of “over 400 processes relating to the evolution of grammatical categories” (2002: 1). Body-part nouns grammaticalize mainly into adpositions (Heine et al. 1991: 123ff). In some cases, these nouns may also evolve into personal pronouns, and even numerals.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi ��.��63/9789004274297_��4

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In his Studies in Semitic Grammaticalization, Rubin mentions some bodypart nouns that have grammaticalized into reflexive, reciprocal, and independent personal pronouns in Semitic languages in general and in Ethiosemitic in particular (Rubin 2005: 19–24). What is largely ignored in Rubin’s work, however, is the grammaticalization of body-part terms into adpositions (cf. Rubin 2005: 47–48). The other few studies on grammaticalization in Ethiopian languages do not specifically address the issue of body-part terms (see, for example, Łykowska 2003, 2006, 2009; Binyam 2008, Abinet 2010, Henok 2010, and Debela 2011). In the present work it will be shown that body-part nouns in Ethiosemitic languages grammaticalize into adpositions, adverbs, subordinators, and personal pronouns. The following list represents a simplified outline of seventeen Ethiosemitic languages considered in the study (see Abinet 2010: 2, and the references cited therein): North Ethiosemitic: †Ge’ez, Tigre, Tigrinya; Transversal South Ethiosemitic: Amharic, Argobba, Harari, Silt’e, Wolane, Zay; Outer South Ethiosemitic: Chaha, Endegeň, Dobbi, Inor, Mäsqan, Muher, Kistane, †Gafat. The study is organized as follows: Section I presents the Introduction. Section II deals with the evolution of adpositions; Section III, with the formation of Personal Pronouns. A brief summary is given in Section IV. 2

Body-Part Terms > Adpositions

2.1 Adpositions in Ethiosemitic Adpositions are mainly derived from nouns (N-adpositions) and verbs (V-adpositions). Our interest here is on the former type of adpositions. N-adpositions are derived mainly from nouns that denote either body parts or landmarks. Body-part terms form the most important source for the expression of spatial concepts (cf. Heine et al. 1991: 128). When head nouns in genitive constructions grammaticalize we get grammatical forms known as N-adpositions (Heine 1997: 59). The development of N-adpositions in Ethiosemitic languages can be seen within this framework. One of the interesting cases of adpositions in Ethiosemitic is the shift made from prepositions to postpositions (through the intermediate stage of circumpositions). This has happened following the change of the basic word order from Semitic VSO to SOV (due to contact with the surrounding SOV languages). Apart from Ge’ez, all Ethiosemitic languages have shifted to a basic SOV word order. All the South Ethiosemitic languages have developed postpositions while preserving some of their former prepositions. Consequently, these

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languages now have prepositions, postpositions, and even circumpositions at their disposal. Harari, of course, is exceptional by making a nearly complete shift to postpositions. Tigre and Tigrinya have not yet shifted to postpositional language type. This historic shift of typology from prepositional to postpositional language type has proceeded as follows: SVO > SOV, NAdj > AdjN, NGen > GenN, and Prep. > Postp (cf. Greenberg 1980, Croft 1990: 218–230). The change from NGen > GenN (the relative order of the possessive attribute (Gen) and its head noun(N)) seems directly responsible for the development of postpositions. In the 14th century (cf. Croft 1990: 223), for example, Amharic had an N yä Gen construction alternating with yä GenN. Through time the latter has now replaced the former. In the N yäGen format, we could imagine constructions like: hwala yä bet-u (back of-house-DEF) ‘back of the house’. With the shift to yä GenN, we now have yä bet-u hwala (of-house-DEF back). When the genitive marker (yä ) is deleted, there appears the postposition hwala alone or as a second post-posed element in a circumposition (prepN postp, prep- PRF postp): (kä-) betu hwala suq allä ((LOC.-) house-DEF back shop there-is) ‘there is a shop behind the house’; kä-hedä (bä-hwala) mät’t’aš (after he.went (after) you-came(fem.)) ‘you came after he went’.1 In the second instance, note that the postposition is optional; hwala is directly reinforced by the preposition bä-. Such direct reinforcement is also the case when hwala serves as an adverb: hanna hwala /bä-hwala /wädä hwala mät’t’ačč (H. after she-came) ‘Hannah came later’. The cognitive activity involved in the grammaticalization of body-part nouns to adpositions is metaphoric in nature (Heine et al. 1991: 131). Body parts are concrete, visible, and tangible. Adpositions refer to locative notions and represent abstract spatial concepts. We therefore conceive and express spatial concepts in terms of body-part nouns. In a general way, we conceptualize metaphorically logical relations (like CAUSAL, CONDITIONAL, and ADVERSATIVE relations) in terms of SPATIAL relations, SPATIAL relations in terms of physical OBJECTS (cf. Heine 1997: 150). The contact- induced structural transfer mentioned above and the possible cognitive activity of metaphorical transfer of body-part nouns into grammatical forms may clearly be illustrated in the following example:

1 There is a similar discussion about the origin of nominal postpositions in Voigt (1999, cited in Yri 2006: 124).

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(1) a)  Old Amharic: N yä Gen fit yä abənnät face of A. ‘face of Abinet’ b) Present-day Amharic yä abənnät fit of A. face   ‘face of Abinet’ c) Genitive Marker ( yä) > ɸ abənnät fit A. face ‘in front of Abinet’ d) Prepostion + noun + postpostion, kä-abənnät fit at-A. face ‘in front of Abinet’ e) Body part noun > Postpostions (Metaphorically conceptualized) kä-bet-u fit at- house-DEF face ‘in front of the house’

In the last example (1e), the front of a house is metaphorically conceived in parallel with a human face.2 At this stage the body-part region ‘face’ of an animate object is extended to denote the front region of inanimate objects (cf. Heine 1997: 44). When the human body in its upright position “serves as a conceptual template for the development of grammatical categories” (Heine 1997: 18), we invoke the anthropomorphic model. In some cases we may also invoke the zoomorphic model when the body of a four-legged animal serves as a conceptual template. We may then find two expressions for the spatial concept ON based on either the body part ‘head’ of a human being or the body part ‘back’ of a four-legged animal (cf. Heine 1997: 46). The ‘back’ of a four-legged animal is positioned to be perceived as UP; its head as FRONT, and its ‘buttocks/anus’ as BACK. 2 It was Prof. Heine who brought the metaphorical phase of example (1e) to my attention.

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In a cross-linguistic study made, the spatial reference point ON (above, over, up, on top of) was found to have the body part ‘head’ as its source concept. Likewise, UNDER (down, below) derives from the body part buttock or foot; BACK (behind, after) from the body part ‘back’; FRONT (before, in front of, ahead) from the body parts ‘face’, ‘eye’ or ‘mouth’; IN (inside, within) from the body part belly/stomach (Heine et al. 1991: 123). A similar, if not identical, trend is seen in the grammaticalization of the ten body-part terms chosen for the present study. Thus, ‘back’ is mainly associated with the spatial concept BEHIND; ‘buttocks’ with UNDER or BACK; ‘face’ with FRONT; ‘foot’ with ‘UNDER’; ‘head’ with ON; ‘mouth’ with ‘FRONT’; ‘rib’ with ‘SIDE’; ‘sole of foot’ with ‘BEHIND’; and stomach with IN (for ‘hand’ see below). Other than the first phase of grammaticalization (lexical > grammatical), a possible second phase of grammaticalization (less grammatical > more grammatical) is also considered. The grammaticalization pathways are analyzed within the framework of the following categorial metaphors: OBJECT (body part) > SPACE (LOCATIVE) > TIME (TEMPORAL) > LOGICAL (CAUSAL, CONDITIONAL, ADVERSATIVE, etc.). We will now look at the possible grammaticalization of each of the ten body-part terms listed alphabetically. 2.2 BACK (‘back of the body’, ‘loins’) In nearly all Ethiopian Semitic languages, terms for back of the body grammaticalize mainly into LOCATIVE and further into TEMPORAL markers. In Tigre, however, the word for back of the body further grammaticalizes into CAUSAL and CONDITIONAL markers. Some of the developments are shown below. Ge’ez zabān ‘back, back part, tail’ > ba zabān ‘behind’ (Leslau 1987: 631); Amharic ğärba ‘back of the body’ > ‘behind’, postposition (Leslau 1995: 682); Argobba gunž ‘back of the body’ > ‘behind’ (Leslau 1956: 682); Wolane rer ‘back of the body’ > bä-rer ‘after’ (Leslau 1987: 13); rēr ‘after (temporal), behind’ (Meyer 2006: 183). Moreover, Leslau (1956: 682) connects qäsäla ‘back of the body’ of Gafat to the Chaha qät’əwä and Amharic qät’t’əlo ‘after’, both spatial and temporal. The last instance might be connected to Amharic qit’ ‘buttocks’. Ge’ez ħaqwe ‘loins, hip’, likewise Arabic ħaqw ‘waist’, Tigre ħaqwe, Tigrinya ћaqqät ‘loins, hip’, Harari ћač’i ‘back of body’, develops into ‘behind, after’ in the “various Gurage dialects as well as in Tigre ћaqo ‘after, behind’ ” (Leslau 1979: 72). Harari ћač’i, and Silt’e anč’e ‘back of the body’, do not seem to show any further development in shift of category. In contrast to these two languages, the word clearly grammaticalizes to LOCATIVE and TEMPORAL markers in the following languages: Chaha tä . . . anqyä ‘after, behind’, postposition; bä- + PRF + anqyä ‘after’, subordinator (Leslau 1956: 681–682). This goes similarly for Muher, Mäsqan and

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Dobbi (also called Gogot) (Leslau 1956: 682; 1979: 56, 72). In Zay, ħaqwe develops into adverbs and postpositions (Leslau 1999: 162): anč’i ‘backwards’, lä -anč’i ‘afterwards, later on’, adverb; -anč’i in lä . . . anč’i ‘behind’, postposition. In Tigre, ħaqwe shows a high degree of grammaticalization: it develops from a NOUN of a body part to (LOCATIVE) > TEMPORAL > CONDITIONAL, CAUSAL markers. Tigre ћaqo ‘after’ (temporal), preposition (Raz 1983: 80): ћaqo kəl’e sāmən ‘after two weeks’; (Elias 2005: 193): (2) ћaqo gala ’əwān ’əgəl təfgarta AFTER SOME TIME SHE-WILL-GO-OUT ‘After a few minutes, she will go out’

Tigre of Habab (unlike Tigre of Mensa‘) has ћaqo +PRF ‘if’ (Elias 2005: 205, note 137): (3) māy ћaqo ’alabka šahi kəfo wadda WATER IF YOU-MS-DO-NOT-HAVE TEA HOW YOU-MS-MAKE ‘If you don’t have water, how do you make tea?’

Tigre of Mensa‘(unlike Tigre of Habab) has ћaqo ‘because’: ћaqo halibkum säta ‘because he drank your milk’ (Leslau 1945: 199). The spatial sense of Tigre ћaqo is not recorded by Leslau 1945, Raz 1983, or Elias 2005. 2.3 Buttocks The body-part noun for ‘buttocks’ in Ethiosemitic grammaticalizes mainly into BEHIND, AFTER, and DOWN. The Ge’ez word for ‘buttocks’ (‘posterior part’), käwala has an extended meaning BEHIND. Amharic, Kistane, and Silt’e words for ‘behind, after, down, under’ are all related to the Ge’ez käwala (Leslau 1956: 682–83). Amharic hwwala ‘behind, after’ (with k > h) has lost its original meaning of ‘buttocks’. It has only the LOCATIVE meaning which further grammaticalizes to a TEMPORAL marker (Leslau 1995: 617–618): (4) ə-betaččən hwwala zaf allä at-our house behind tree there-is ‘There is a tree behind our house’ (5) kä-qurs bä-hwwala bunna tät’t’an LOC.-breakfast by-after coffee we-drank ‘We drank coffee after breakfast’

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(6) kä-hedä bä-hwwala mät’t’an Loc.-he.went after we.came ‘We came after he went’

The postposition hwala could also be combined with prepositions like bä, kä, wädä (cf. (5) above) to form adverbs: bä-hwala ‘later, later on, afterward, behind’; kä-hwala ‘behind’; wädä hwala ‘toward the back, later’. Kistane has fola ‘afterwards’ (from käwala with w > hw > fw, f ); ya-fola ‘after, behind’; bäfola ‘behind, beyond, after’. Silt’e has kolo ‘down, under, underneath’ (Gutt and Hussein 1997:652–53). In Amharic and Kistane, the word for ‘buttocks’ grammaticalizes to BEHIND, AFTER which could be accounted for by the zoomorphic model where the buttocks is located behind a four-legged animal. In Silt’e, we have ‘buttocks’ > DOWN, where we should invoke the anthropomorphic model for an upright standing human being (cf. Heine et al. 1991: 126–127). 2.4 Face In Ethiosemitic, FACE grammaticalizes into FRONT, FIRST, BEFORE, EARLIER, LATER, SIDE, and DIRECTION. Amharic for instance has fit ‘face’ > ‘earlier, before, side’ (Desta 1970: 1010); fit ‘face’ > ‘in front’, postposition, as in säw fit attəqum (man face do-not-stand) ‘don’t stand in front of people’; bä- . . . fit ‘in front of, before’. When combined with prepositions, it forms adverbs like bä-fit ‘before, earlier, formerly, at first’; wädä fit (toward face) ‘in the future, forward, later on, further, ahead, ever’ (Leslau 1995: 855). Chaha has yǝft ‘face’ > ‘first’; yǝfte ‘first’ (adverb)’, ‘ahead’ (Leslau 1950: 167). Ge’ez has gas’s’ ‘face’ > ‘direction, side’ as in artǝ’a gas’s’ ‘he went toward’ (Leslau 1987: 205). Some Amharic expressions are also worth mentioning in connection with Ge‘ez gas’s’: angat’t’ät’ä ‘looked upwards; lifted one’s eyes’ ; aqtač’č’a ‘direction’ (Desta 1970: 251); gäčč alä ‘appear in front of’; (tä) gaččä ‘clash, collide,’ that is, come face to face (Leslau 1987: 206). Silt’e has uft ‘face’; uft-kollo ‘down, downwards’, adverb; kollo ‘down’; uft-darra ‘upwards, uphill’, adverb, where darr means ‘upper side, top’ (Gutt and Hussein 1997: 583). 2.5 Foot (‘foot’, ‘leg’) The Amharic body-part noun for ‘foot’, əgər, acquires an additional meaning of ‘DOWN’ and ‘INSTEAD’ when used as a postposition (Leslau 1995: 637, 652): kägas’s’u gər-ge ‘down the page’; bä-abbatu əgər ‘on behalf of his father’; gər-ge ‘at the foot of, below, beneath’, ge ‘side’. In Silt’e too, the word for ‘foot’, ingir, grammaticalizes to DOWN as in yiingir-ge ‘lower, lower down, beneath’ (Gutt and

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Hussein 1997: 615). Chaha has ägr-e, from the noun ägər ‘foot’, which means ‘down’, literally ‘in the direction of the foot’. This further acquires the meaning BEHIND as in bä . . . ägər ‘in the back of’ (Leslau 1950: 146; 1956: 683). 2.6 Hand With the probable exception of Amharic and Kistane (see section 3), we do not find a clear instance of the grammaticalization of the body part ‘hand’ in Ethiosemitic languages. The Amharic body-part noun əğğ ‘hand’ acquires an additional meaning and serves as postposition: bä . . . əğğ ‘by, in custody of’ (Leslau, 1995: 637). Leslau (1987: 602) connects the Amharic preposition wädä ‘to, toward’ (ALLATIVE) to Ge’ez wə’da ‘where, in the place, along’ which in turn is possibly from the root for ‘hand’, ’əd, with a deictic w. If Leslau’s etymology is correct, we would have the grammaticalization of HAND > ALLATIVE. The mechanism that underlies such a possible evolution seems to be the use of a ‘hand’ in referring to directions. Attested cases of a similar nature include the development of ‘eye’ into an allative marker and ‘hand’ into an ablative marker (cf. Svorou 1994:78 cited in Heine 1997:45). 2.7 Head + -ge ‘side of’ Most of the south Ethiosemitic languages add the suffix -ge ‘side of’ to their words for ‘head’ to refer to ‘head of bed’ (Leslau 1963: 66; 1999: 208): Amharic ras-ge, Kistane gunna-ge, Silt’e dəmi-ge, Wolane dəmi-ge, Zay dəm(ə)-gi. HEAD + -ge ‘head of bed’ could also assume a further meaning of ‘ABOVE’ as in the Amharic example below (Leslau 1995: 652): (7) kä-betaččən ras-ge LOC-our house head-side ‘There is a hill above our house’

gubbəta allä hill there-is

Other than ‘head’, Amharic has four more nouns for body parts which combine with the suffix -ge: angät-ge ‘neck-side, collar’, əğğə-ge ‘hand-side, sleeve’, wägäb-ge ‘waist-side, belt’, and əgər-ge ‘leg-side, down, beneath’. Wilkins (1996: 300, note 8) notes that Australian English uses the terms ‘neck’ or ‘arm’ to refer to the collar or sleeve of a shirt. According to him, the semantic extension could be accounted for by both metonymic and metaphoric association: on the body, the collar is contiguous to the neck and the sleeve to the arm; off the body, the collar is similar to the shape of the neck and the sleeve to the arm. The same explanation could be applied for the Amharic ‘neck-side’ > ‘collar’, ‘hand-side’ > ‘sleeve’ semantic extension. (For more on these combinations and on the morpheme ge, see Abinet 2010.)

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2.8 Mouth Among Ethiosemitic languages, grammaticalization of the body part ‘mouth’ seems to be limited to only Wolane and Tigre. In Wolane, a body-part noun ’af ‘mouth’ functions as a relational noun meaning ‘just in front of’ (Meyer 2006: 183). In Tigre, the preposition ’ət ’af ‘before’ comes from af ‘mouth’ (Raz 1983: 83): (8) ’əgəl sar cāmat lagabbə’ ’ətta təmaharko For half year which is there I studied ‘Before that, I studied there for about half a year’

’ət ’af ‘əlla before that

2.9 RIB For the body part ‘RIB’, Ge‘ez has gwädən, Tigrinya gwadni, Amharic gwadən, Dobbi gwädin, Zay godən, Kistane godin. With assimilation of d to n, we further have Amharic gwänn, gonn, Kistane gwän, and Silt’e gon ‘side of body, place, side’ (Leslau 1979:264, 280). For the grammaticalization of RIB > FLANK > SIDE > BESIDE, observe the instances from Amharic (Leslau, 1995: 654): gwädən ‘rib’, gwänn, gonn ‘flank, side’, kä- . . . gwänn ‘beside, alongside’, postposition; gwänn lä-gwann ‘side by side’, adverb; wädä gwänn ask’ämmät’ä ‘lay aside’. In Harari mihi ‘near, beside’ is from mihāt ‘ribs’ (Leslau, 1963: 105–6). In Gunnän-Gurage languages (all Outer South Ethiosemitic excluding Gafat), the postposition as in bä- . . . miyee ‘near’ is from miya ‘rib, side’ (Hetzron 1977: 55). In Silt’e, meet’t’aq ‘flank’ also means ‘side’ (Gutt and Hussein, 1997: 93). Ge’ez gabo ‘side’ is from ‘rib, flank, loins’ (Leslau, 1987: 176); Tigre (‘əb) səmət’ ‘near, along, beside’ is from səmt’ ‘flank’ (Leslau1945: 197). Outside of Ethiosemitic, we have the following similar developments in Cushitic languages: Burgi dina, Hadiyya midaado, Oromo c’inaa ‘ribs’ > ‘side’ (Hudson 1989:134). As in Oromo, č’ən occurs in Ethiosemitic Silt’e, Wolane, Zay, and Muher č’ənä ‘thigh, hip, back of body’. Amharic, Argobba, and Gafat have č’ən ‘thigh’, Harari has č’ən ‘waist’. According to Leslau, the derivation of č’ən from Ge’ez ħəs’ən and Tigre ħəs’ən ‘hip’ is plausible (1979: 183). The interesting thing about č’ən is that it grammaticalizes into an ADVERSATIVE ‘but’ in the three Outer South Ethiosemitic languages: Chaha, Eža, and Gyeto (Leslau 1979: 182). Consider the example from Chaha (Leslau 1950: 40, text line 21): (9)  . . . garad xita č’ən čəma yäsäč’äče attəm qar atbära the-girl but an anthelmintic because she drank anything does not eat ‘But the girl does not eat anything because she drank anthelmintic’

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The semantic extension could have occurred from ‘back of body’ indicating the concept ‘on the opposite side, on the contrary’ or from ‘hip, thigh’ (located on the right and left side of the body) implying ‘on the other side, on the other hand’. I suspect that č’ən with the notion of ‘but’ could be connected with Amharic, Tigrinya, Gafat, Muher, Silt’e, and Wolane gən ‘but’; and gən, in turn, could also be connected with gwädən ‘rib’ > gwänn, gonn ‘flank, side’. But we need more evidence to claim so with more conviction. 2.10 Sole (‘sole of foot’, ‘trace’, ‘track’) In two Ethiosemitic languages the body part ‘sole’ develops into AFTER, LATER. In Tigre, the preposition ‘asär ‘after’ develops from an original meaning of ‘sole of foot, trace’ (cf. Ge’ez ‘asär, asar ‘trace, track, sole of foot, foot print; path’ (Leslau 1956: 683, 1987:45). Consider the example below (Raz 1983:81): (10) wahətu kəm mota ‘asaru waldu mahammad ‘əgəl And-he when he-died after-him his son M. to ləšaymo ħazaw they-appoint they wanted ‘And since he had died, they wanted to appoint his son Mohammed after him’

In Silt’e the postposition zoof ‘after’ (as in bä-+ [noun] + zoof ) and the adverb ba-zoof ‘next, then, afterwards, later on, finally, at last’ derives from a bodypart noun zoof ‘track, sole of foot’ (Leslau 1956: 683). The postposition further develops into subordinating conjunction (ba-+ [PRF] + zoof ‘after’) as in the following (Gutt and Hussein 1997: 709): (11) baare ba-balaana zoof arama yeermanaan lunch Loc.-we.ate after weed we.will.weed ‘We will weed after we have eaten lunch’

2.11 Stomach (‘belly’, ‘abdomen’) In some Ethiosemitic languages a development from ‘stomach’ to IN (spatial) is observed. In Tigre, we have kärəs ‘inside’ (Leslau 1956: 685, note 27) from the body-part noun kars ‘stomach’; ‘ət kabəd ‘in (side)’ (Raz 1983: 84) from kabd ‘stomach’ < ‘liver’. In Gunnän-Gurage languages (Chaha, Endegeň, Dobbi, Inor, Mäsqan, Muher, Kistane) bä . . . käs means ‘in, inside, among’ (Hetzron 1977: 55). This too is from the body-part noun kars ‘stomach’.

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Body-Part Terms > Pronouns

This section discusses the formation of personal independent pronouns (3.1) and reflexive pronouns (3.2) from body-part terms. (There are similar developments for reciprocal pronouns like Amharic ərs bä-rs (head by-head) and Gurage languages gäg bä-gäg (body by-body) ‘each other’. These will not however be dealt with in this study.) 3.1 Head, Stomach, Soul, (Hand) > Independent Personal Pronouns Since personal pronouns belong to the most conservative parts of grammar, research on their grammaticalization has so far been quite sparse (Heine & Song 2011:587). The recent work of Heine and Song seems to be a major contribution to this area. In their work on the grammaticalization of personal pronouns, the authors made a cross linguistic analysis of first, second, and third pronouns. Their overall discussion is based on the five main conceptual sources of personal pronouns (p. 594): (a) Nominal concepts (b) Spatial deixis (demonstratives), (c) Intensifiers, (d) Plurification, and (e) Shift in deixis. For the discussion of the grammaticalization of independent personal pronouns in Ethiosemitic, the last three sources are found relevant. Among Ethiosemitic languages Amharic, Argobba, and Tigrinya have made a remarkable shift in replacing their third person pronouns by possessive forms of body-part nouns. Tigrinya has gone further by replacing even its second person pronouns by the same mechanism (cf. Hetzron 1972, and Rubin 2005). As the possessive forms of the body-part nouns proceed to develop reflexives and pronouns of insistence, the conceptual source of the newly developed personal pronouns could be intensifiers. This is the third source in the list of main sources by Heine and Song. We will now look at each of the three cases in turn. The third person pronouns of Amharic are ərsu, əssu (he), ərswa, əsswa (she), ənnärsu [ənnä-, a plural prefix + ərsu] ‘they’, and ərsaččäw ‘he’ (polite). Though optional, in all cases r could assimilate resulting in the gemination of s (Hetzron 1972: 31). The pronouns are formed by the body-part noun *ərs ‘head’ (cf. Ge‘ez rə‘əs ‘head’) plus possessive modifiers. Accordingly, ərs-u originally meant ‘his head’, ərs-wa ‘her head’, ərs-aččäw ‘their head’. These further developed to mean ‘himself’, ‘herself’, and ‘themselves’. These reflexive pronouns and pronouns of insistence went further in their evolution to become the third person independent pronouns of present-day Amharic. The conceptual sources of present-day Amharic pronouns of polite address (second person singular respect pronoun) would appear to be plurification and shift in deixis. Plurification, according to Heine and Song, denotes the use of pronouns to refer to single persons; the shift made is from plural to honorific

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singular function. A shift in dexis is usually a shift from third to second person. This concerns the grammaticalization of third person plural pronouns to second person pronouns (Heine and Song 2011: 600, 601 and 619). The second person singular respect pronoun of modern Amharic is ərswo. Before it came to assume this function, ərswo served first as a third person plural ‘they’ and then as ‘he’ (polite). The processes involved are first plurification and then a shift in dexis. When ərswo began to function as ‘he’ (polite), it was replaced by ərsaččäw ‘they’ to avoid confusion. But ərsaččäw too began to function as ‘he’ (polite) and was consequently replaced by ənnärsu, ənnäsu ‘they’. The process of change involved is mainly plurification. (For a detailed discussion of ərswo and ərsaččäw, see Kapeliuk (1994); see also Hetzron (1972: 31, 89). On the Amharic ərswo, see also Heine and Song 2011: 604.) Like Amharic, Argobba too has replaced its original third person independent pronouns by possessive forms of the body-part noun *kars ‘stomach’ (Leslau 1997:20): kəssu ‘he’ (originally ‘his stomach’ > ‘himself’ > ‘he’), kəssa ‘she’ (‘her stomach’ > ‘herself’ > ‘she’), and kəssäm (‘their stomach’ > ‘themselves’ > ‘they’). In the process of change intensifiers such as himself appear in the second phase as was the case in Amharic and Tigrinya (see below). Tigrinya replaced its original second and third person independent pronouns by possessive forms of the body-part noun * nafs ‘soul’ body (cf. Rubin 2005: 19–24, and the references cited therein): nəssu 3MSG (< ‘himself’ < ‘his soul’), nəssa 3FSG, (< ‘herself’ < ‘her soul’), nəssa(at)om 3MPL, nəssa(at)än 3FPL, nəssəxa 2MSG, nəssəxi 2FSG, nəssəxatkum 2MPL, nəssəxtkən 2FPL. In addition to second and third persons, Tigrinya has also got nəssatna as a variant of nəhna ‘we’. Other than the second person plural pronoun, there is also a variant of the 1SG ʔanä in one of the dialects of Tigrinya. The variant is nəssäy. Both nəssatna ‘we’ and nəssäy ‘I’ appear to have developed through the possessive forms of the noun *nafs as did the second and third persons. The polite forms of the second and third person pronouns of Tigrinya are the same: nəssom (2M), nəssän (2F), nəssom (3M), and nəssän (3F). These are originally 3MPL and 3FPL. Unlike Amharic, Tigrinya makes no distinction between the second and third person pronouns of respect (Hetzron 1972: 89). In the process of change, both plurification and a shift of deixis are involved. To summarize, we have ‘head’ as a source for Amharic ‘he’, ‘stomach’ for Argobba, and ‘soul’ for Tigrinya. As an alternative to these triple-sources, Voigt (2009: 179–182) proposes a single common source for the three independent personal pronouns in the three languages.3 He argues that the “etymological 3 Upon my request, Prof. Gensler translated part of Voigt’s 2009 paper from German. I express my heartfelt thanks to him.

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derivation of [the three forms] needs to be considered in the light of Old Amharic” where the 3MSG is hənsu (as was observed by Getachew (1970: 66)). The claim of Voigt then is that all the three forms of modern Ethiopic might go back to hənsu of Old Amharic (Voigt 2009: 179). Voigt further demonstrates how hənsu could be derived from Old Ethiopic karśə, and this in turn from a Proto-Semitic *kariś ‘stomach, belly’ (p. 180ff). Getachew has observed the occurrence of this word in a manuscript which likely dates from the 16th century. The word occurs only once in the manuscript (1966: 65, note 5). But, contrary to this, other forms of the word are given: bähənsu, täħənsu, xənsut, yalhənsus, wäy ħənsu. Getachew further comments that the present-day Amharic əssu and Tigrinya nəssu ‘he’ “may have their origin in this ħənsu which may have nothing to do with the Ge’ez rə’əs ‘head’ as is now generally accepted” (p. 66). Voigt comes in here and takes ħənsu to have still developed from karsu > ħənsu > Argobba kəssu, Amharic əssu, Tigrinya nəssu. Voigt clearly demonstrates the possibility of deriving əssu, kəssu, and nəssu from *kariś. But he equally argues for the plausibility of the triple-source model, that is if I have understood him properly. Even though Voigt’s proposal of a single-source appears to be attractive, it is not backed by enough and convincing evidence. It would therefore be better to stick to the widely held view of the triple-source model. Let us now look at the case for ‘hand’. Kistane (also called Soddo, Aymellel) has ädi for its first person singular pronoun. Note also the following: dähä 2MSG; däš 2FSG; dähəm 2MPL; dähəmä 2FPL. Though with little conviction, Hetzron connects the component ä(d)- with the word for ‘hand’ *əd (Hetzron 1972: 31). If Hetzron is correct on this etymology, we will have the grammaticalization of HAND > 1SG. Leslau’s reservation on this etymology is that ‘hand’ in Kistane is expressed by äğ, not by əd. The derivation of ädi from kabd, hod ‘stomach’ by Praetorius (1879: 511) is also doubtful in Leslau’s view (Leslau 1979: 13). 3.2 body, Head, Soul > Reflexive Pronouns In many of the Ethiosemitic languages, reflexive pronouns are formed from body-part nouns for ‘head’, ‘soul’, and ‘body’ itself ; and in one case ‘bone’, together with suffixed pronouns. In Chaha, Endegeň, Muher, Mäsqan, Dobbi, Silt’e, Wolane, and Zay, gäg- ‘body’ forms the basis of expressions ‘I myself’, ‘he himself’ and so on. The word gäg itself is borrowed from Cushitic (Kambata, Hadiyya), gäga ‘body, self’ (Leslau 1999: 214). Note the two instances from Zay (12), (Leslau 1999: 25) and Silt’e (13), (Gutt and Hussein 1997: 779): (12) äya gäg-ay yəmät’āhu ‘I myself will come’

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(13) ilihan saba yak’abat’a gina gag-ka gabaya heeda ‘Lacking somebody to send to the market, he went himself’

The body-part term for ‘head’ is another common source for forming reflexive pronouns. Amharic has ras- ‘head’ as in (14), (Goldenberg 1991: 535): (14) ras-wan yämməttəwädd təmäsläňňalläčč (herself that-she-loves she-seems-to-me) ‘She seems to me one who loves herself’

Tigre too has ra’as ‘head’ for reflexive pronouns (Raz 1983: 41). Argobba has dəmah ‘head’ for pronouns of insistence (Leslau 1997: 21): (15) ay bä-dəmah I with-my head ‘I shall come myself’

əmät’älluh I-shall-come

Words for ‘soul’ are also used in the formation of reflexive pronouns. In Tigre it is nos, nafs ‘soul’ (Raz 1983: 41). Harari (Leslau 1963: 134): ruћ ‘soul’, ruћ- ‘oneself’, ruћ-zō-le ‘by itself, by his own accord’; Chaha (Leslau 1950: 148) has arwa ‘soul’, yarwata ‘for himself’. In Argobba, it is näbs ‘soul’ (Leslau 1997: 21): (16) äy näbs-e əmätälluh I my soul I-shall-come ‘I shall come myself’

Unlike the other Ethiosemitic languages, Harari additionally uses a body-part noun for ‘bone’ for the expression of ‘self’ (Leslau 1963: 63): ät’ ‘bone’ (Amharic at’ənt ), ät’t’i ‘self’, at’t’i-zo ‘he, himself’. 4 Conclusion In this study it was shown that a number of body-part nouns grammaticalize mainly into adverbs and adpositions. In some cases, the adpositions were also seen developing further into subordinators. The overall transfer of category observed is therefore from nominals of body parts to adverbial word classes: adverbs and adpositions (in North Ethiosemitic, these are mainly prepositions and in South Ethiosemitic, mainly postpositions). The postpositions usually appear with prepositions as the second post-posed elements in the

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circumpositions formed. Moreover, it is to be noted that, except in rare cases, in Ethiosemitic, postpositions alone could not serve as subordinators. This should however be different in Harari, where some postpositions would likely exhibit a high degree of grammaticality: like gir ‘time > if’. By applying the concept of case in its broader sense to adpositions (cf. Blake 1994: 198), we can extend the categorial transfer to case markers as well. In this way, Tigre ћaqo ‘after’ (preposed) and Amharic hwala ‘behind, after’ (postposed) could be taken as adpositional case markers. In a similar fashion, expressions like Silt’e bä-+[noun]+zoof ‘after’ and Amharic kä- +[noun]+ hwala ‘behind’ could be taken as circumpositional case markers when they enclose nominals. We could also call these forms “circumpositional clausal subordinators” when they enclose finite verbs instead of nominals as in Silt’e bä-+[PRF]+ zoof ‘after’ and Amharic kä- +[PRF]+ bä-hwala ‘after’. (For the use of the term circumposition cf. (Lehmann 1995: 94), Hetzron (1977: 55), Berhanu and Hetzron (2000: 59)). To summarize, regarding the development of adpositional concepts, it was found that body-part terms in Ethiosemitic grammaticalize mainly into prepositional, postpositional, and circumpositional case markers; circumpositional and prepositional subordinators, contrastive conjunction, and adverbs. This is summarized in (17) with the examples repeated here for convenience. (17) a. Prepositional case markers Tigre: ћaqo ‘after’ (from ħaqwe ‘loins, hip, back of body’) ћaqo gala ’əwān ’əgəl təfgarta AFTER SOME TIME SHE-WILL-GO-OUT ‘After a few minutes, she will go out’ b. Postpositional case markers Amharic: fit ‘front’ (< ‘face’) bett-u fit suq allä house-DEF face shop there-is ‘There is a shop in front of the house’ c. Circumpositional case markers (A postposition as a second post-posed element in a circumposition, prep- +noun + postp) Amharic: fit (< ‘face’) kä-bett-u fit suq allä LOC.-house-DEF face shop there-is ‘There is a shop in front of the house’

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d. Circumpositional subordinators (A postposition as a second post-posed element in a circumposition, prep- +PRF+ postp.) Silt’e: ba-+ [PRF] + zoof ‘after’ (< ‘sole of foot, trace, back of body’) baare ba-balaana zoof arama yeermanaan lunch LOC.-we.ate after weed we-will-weed ‘We will weed after we have eaten lunch’ e. Prepositional subordinators Tigre: ћaqo +PRF ‘if’ (from ħaqwe ‘loins, hip, back of body’) māy ћaqo ’alabka šahi kəfo wadda WATER IF YOU-MS-DO-NOT-HAVE TEA HOW YOU-MS-MAKE ‘If you don’t have water, how do you make tea?’ f. Contrastive conjunction Chaha: č’ən ‘but’ ( Adverbial Phrase (cf. Heine et al. 1991: 131). From still another perspective, the grammaticalization paths taken could also be summarized in this fashion: (body part) OBJECT > LOCATIVE > TEMPORAL > CONDITIONAL, CAUSAL, and ADVERSATIVE. The CONDITIONAL and CAUSAL are attested only in Tigre. The ADVERSATIVE is attested only in three Gunnän-Gurage languages, č’ən ‘hip, thigh’ > ‘but’, where the intermediate stages (LOCATIVE, TEMPORAL) are missing. The path taken by č’ən could alternatively be put as: (body part) OBJECT > ADVERSATIVE. Body-part terms for ‘soul’, ‘body’, ‘head’, and ‘stomach’ were mentioned in their role of forming independent personal pronouns and reflexive pronouns. The remarkable pathway in this case is the development of independent personal pronouns from body-part terms. This does not seem to be a very common occurrence in other languages the world over (cf. Heine and Kuteva 2002, Heine and Song 2011). What may still need further investigation is the possible etymology of Kistane ädi 1SG. Voigt’s single-source (kars) proposal vs. the triplesources (kars, nafs, and ras) model may also need a further investigation. This

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study has focused on Ethiosemitic. Further research in this area may have to consider the other Cushitic, Omotic, and Nilo-Saharan languages of Ethiopia. Acknowledgements The first draft of this paper was read at Body in Language (BIL) International Conference at Warsaw 21–22 October 2011. I would like to thank Prof. Heine and the other participants for their helpful comments. I would also like to thank Prof. Iwona Kraska-Szlenk and the anonymous reviewer for their detailed and insightful comments on the first draft of this chapter. References Abinet S. G. 2010. Grammaticalization of the Morpheme ge: A Study in Ethiosemitic. Saarbrücken: VDM Verlag Dr. Müller Aktiengesellschaft. Berhanu C. and R. Hetzron. 2000. Inor. Munich: LINCOM Europa. Binyam S. M. 2008. Aspects of Koorete Verb Morphology. PhD Dissertation, University of Oslo. Blake, B. J. 1994. Case. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Croft, W. 1991. Typology and universals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Debela G. A. 2011. Semantics of Oromo Adpositions. PhD Dissertation, University of Oslo. Desta T.-W. 1970 [1962 (EC)]. Addis yamarəňňa mäzgäbä k’alat. Addis Ababa: Artistic Printers. Elias, D. L. 2005. Tigre of Habab: Short Grammar and Texts from the Rigbat People. PhD Dissertation, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Getachew H. 1970. Archaic Amharic Forms. Proceedings of the Third International Conference of Ethiopian Studies, 61–80. Addis Ababa: Institute of Ethiopian Studies. Goldenberg, G. 1991. “Oneself”, “one’s own” and “one another” in Amharic. Semitic Studies, vol. 1/pp. 531–549. Greenberg, J. H. 1980. Circumfixes and Typological Change. In: E. C. Traugott et al. (eds.), Papers from the Fourth International Conference on Historical Linguistics, 233– 241. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Gutt, Eva H. M. and Hussein M. M. 1997. Silt’e-Amharic-English Dictionary. Addis Ababa: Addis Ababa University Press. Heine, B. 1997. Cognitive Foundations of Grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Heine, B., U. Claudi and F. Hünnemeyer. 1991. Grammaticalization: A Conceptual Framework. Chicago:University of Chicago Press.

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Heine, B. and T. Kuteva. 2002. World Lexicon of Grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Heine, B. and K. Song. 2011. On the grammaticalization of personal pronouns. J. Linguistics 47, 587–630. Henok W. 2010. Grammaticalization of Copula Markers in the Ometo Subgroup. MA thesis, Addis Ababa University. Hetzron, R. 1972. Ethiopian Semitic. Studies in Classification. Manchester: Manchester University Press. ———. 1977. The Gunnän-Gurage Languages. Naples: Don Bosco. Hudson, G. 1989. Highland East Cushitic Dictionary. Hamburg: Helmut Buske Verlag. Kapeliuk, O. 1994. The Pronouns ərswo and ərsaččäw as sociolinguistic variants. In Bahru Zewde, R Pankhrust and Taddese Beyene (eds), Proceedings of the Eleventh International Conference of Ethiopian Studies, 495–500. Lehmann, C. 1995. Thoughts on Grammaticalization. Munich and Newcastle: LINCOM Europa. Leslau, W. 1945. Grammatical Sketches in Tigre (North Ethiopic), Dialect of Mensa. Journal of the American Oriental Society 65, pp. 1–26. ———. 1950. Ethiopic Documents: Gurage. New York: The Viking Fund. ———. 1956. The expressions ‘under, after’ in the Ethiopic languages. Journal of Near Eastern studies 15, 241–245. ———. 1963. Etymological Dictionary of Harari. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. ———. 1979. Etymological Dictionary of Gurage (Ethiopic). Etymological Section (vol. III). Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. ———. 1987. Comparative Dictionary of Ge‘ez (Classical Ethiopic). Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. ———. 1995. Reference Grammar of Amharic. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. ———. 1997. Ethiopic Documents: Argobba. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. ———. 1999. Zway-Ethiopic Documents: Grammar and Dictionary. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. Łykowska, L. 2003. Grammaticalization of the Amharic Tense System. In: Studies of the Department of African Languages and Cultures, no.34, pp. 27–41. ———. 2006. Grammaticalization Patterns in Amharic: Preliminaries. In: Uhlig, S. (ed). Proceedings of the XVth International Conference of Ethiopian Studies, pp. 803– 812. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag. ———. 2009. The paradigm of the verb “to be (LOC)” in Amharic as an Example of Interaction between Suppletion and Grammaticalization. In: Häberl, G. C. (ed), Afroasiatic Studies in Memory of Robert Hetzron: Proceedings of 35th Annual Meeting of the North American Conference on Afroasiatic Linguistics, 256–270. Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

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Meyer, R. 2006. Wolane. Descriptive Grammar of an East Gurage Language (Ethiosemitic). Cologne: Rödiger Köppe Verlag. Raz, S. 1983. Tigre Grammar and Texts. Malibu: Undena Publications. Rubin, A. D. 2005. Studies in Semitic Grammaticalization. Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns. Voigt, R. 2009. Südtigrinische Dialekte. In: Egytian, Semitic and general grammar: Studies in memory of H. J. Polotsky, ed. by Gedeon Goldenberg and Ariel ShishaHalevy, 169–183. Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities. Yri, K. M. 2006. Decategorialization of Nouns as Postpositions in Sidamo ?afo and Amharic. In: Edzard, L. and J. Retsö (eds.). Current Issues in the Analysis of Semitic Grammar and Lexicon II, Oslo-Göteborg Cooperation 4th–5th-November 2005, pp. 116–131. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag.

Extending Body-Part Terms in the Domain of Emotions Iwona Kraska-Szlenk Abstract This chapter discusses semantic extensions of body-part terms in the domain of emotions. Cross-linguistic evidence demonstrates that lexemes, such as, heart, face or eyes exhibit considerable convergence in developing figurative meanings associated with the conceptualization of emotional states and their manifestation. Common paths of semantic extension are based on metaphors, e.g. locus of emotions is heart, dear person is eye(s), as well as on metonymies, e.g. heart for emotions, face (facial manifestations) for emotions. It is argued that such co-occurring patterns are integrated with language-specific cultural models which reflect different conventionalization and usage practices.

1 Introduction The literature on grammaticalization provides indisputable evidence that body-part terms in various languages follow similar paths in extending their meanings into abstract domains. Heine (this volume) distinguishes several major domains of cross-linguistic grammaticalization patterns that draw on the model of the human body. Heine’s generalizations are supported by the data of innumerable languages researched over a long period of time from a descriptive, as well as from a theoretical perspective.1 The question arises as to whether it is equally possible to search for common extension patterns of body-part terms outside the area of grammaticalization? Comparative evidence of semantic extensions in other domains is not as overwhelmingly compelling as in the case of grammaticalization, which 1 The major works on grammaticalization which contain the data on body-part terms serving as source domains include Heine (1997), Heine et al. (1991), Svorou (1986), as well as many other works devoted to particular languages or language groups. Heine and Kuteva’s (2002) lexicon deserves special attention since it summarizes the previous achievements of grammaticalization in general and provides a broad access to body-part terms, in particular; see also references in Heine (this volume).

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follows from the obvious difference in the number of studies devoted to each topic to the advantage of the latter but, more importantly, to a difference in the number of possible extended meanings. While grammatical notions constitute a relatively small target category, all other cases of possible lexical change amount to a virtually infinite number. This is also true in the case of bodypart terms which have developed relatively few grammaticalized meanings, but have elaborated networks of senses extended into many other domains. Yet, the rapidly growing literature on the lexical semantics of body-part terms in languages of the world demonstrates that there is also a considerable convergence in semantic extension into various other domains. This can be best observed in a collection of studies on various languages (e.g. Sharifian et al. 2008, Maalej and Yu 2011, this volume) and in contrastive studies, especially those which compare unrelated and geographically distant languages, such as e.g. Kraska-Szlenk (2004a, 2005a,c) on Swahili and Polish, or Siahaan (2011) on German and Indonesian. Even though the comparative evidence provided by such studies does not even approach the amount of data and analyses available for the studies on grammaticalization, it nevertheless suggests certain tendencies in semantic development which are too common to be caused by chance, especially since they are triggered by well-understood cognitive processes. Cross-linguistically prevailing patterns seem to be particularly widespread in the following domains: the domain of emotions including certain address terms, the domain of knowledge and reasoning, and the domain of social interactions and values. All these domains are metonymically related to the human body although they may also involve metaphor as a cognitive mechanism. The metonymic bond provides a strong organizational schema for such extensions by which the equivalent body-part terms in different languages follow the same direction of semantic change. For the sake of space, this chapter will focus only on the first of these domains. In addition, there exists a large area of extensions which are mapped through metaphor onto the target domains lying outside the domain of the human body in which the metaphoric mapping of body-part terms is practically unlimited and may include various domains, such as, plants and their parts, landmarks, human made artifacts, foods and other objects. Unlike in the metonymy-grounded extensions mentioned earlier, the meaning extension in cases of this kind is unconstrained as to the target domain (provided some analogy can be made) and is minimally constrained by the schemata used in metaphor application, which may be built on various attributes assigned to particular body parts that are associated with multiple visual aspects or functions of the same lexemes. Cases of this kind, such as e.g. English eye of the

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needle, bottleneck, mouth of the river, are more diversified cross-linguistically and also tend to become more autonomous in their form, either by occurring with obligatory modifiers as in the above English examples (cf. Deignan and Potter 2004: 1238), morphological marking with affixes (cf. Swahili mkono ‘hand/arm’ or ‘sleeve’, but Polish ręka ‘hand/arm’ and rękaw ‘sleeve’), or phonological split (cf. Polish na czole ‘on the forehead’ and na czele ‘at the front’). Extensions of this kind also lie beyond the scope of this chapter. Finally, there are also examples of quite unique and unpredictable semantic change of body-part terms due to cultural reasons, which will be briefly discussed in the final section of this chapter. 2

Inner Organs as Figurative Loci of Emotions

The literature on expressing emotions through embodiment has a long tradition: it began with the pivotal work of Lakoff and Johnson (1980) and has continued in many works since then, e.g. Enfield and Wierzbicka (2002), Kövecses (2000, 2005), Sharifian et al. (2008). As pointed out by many authors (e.g. Johnson 1987, Kövecses 2000, 2005, Lakoff and Johnson 1980, 1999), there is a metonymic connection between experiencing an emotion and physically felt bodily sensation or some other bodily effect, whether medically proven or popularly believed (e.g. heartbeat, blood pressure, liver impairment), which makes inner organs willingly conceptualize as loci of emotions. In fact, it would be hard to find a language which does not use this imagery. Conceptual metaphors of the general schema: locus of emotions is a (particular) body part have been posited in many studies devoted to the descriptions of bodypart terms on the one hand, as well as in the studies on the conceptualization of emotions on the other. Lexical sources of the figurative concept ‘locus of emotions’ may include such body parts as the ‘liver’, as for example in Indonesian (Siahaan 2008), or Dogon (McPherson and Prokhorov 2011), or ‘belly/stomach’, as in Japanese (Matsuki 1995, Berendt and Tanita 2011) or Thaayorre (Gaby 2008). However, cross-linguistically, the most common source is the ‘heart’, as in the following sample of the languages of Europe and other parts of the world: English (Deignan and Potter 2004, Niemeier 2000), Italian (Deignan and Potter 2004), Polish (Kraska-Szlenk 2005a,c), Swahili (Kraska-Szlenk 2005a,b), Chinese (Yu 2008), Tunisian Arabic (Maalej 2008). The following examples from the Swahili and Polish corpora,2 as well as their English translations, 2 The Swahili and Polish data come from my own research and are discussed in detail in Kraska-Szlenk (2005a,b,c). Examples from Modern Standard Arabic (passim) also come from my own research. The data from Turkish and Tamil in section 4 have been kindly provided

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demonstrate the figurative ‘heart’ as a container in which all kinds of emotions may be kept and which may be filled or empty, closed or open, etc. (1) locus of emotions is heart Swahili corpus examples: a/ ma-jonzi a-li-yo-kuw-a na-y-o m-oyo-ni cl6-grief 3sg-past-rel-cl6-be-fv with-cl6- rel cl3-heart-loc ‘grief that he had in his heart’ b/ a-li-anz-a ku-m-funu-li-a m-oyo w-ake 3sg-past-begin- fv cl15-3sg-open-appl- fv cl3-heart cl3-his/her ‘he started to open up his heart for her’ c/ m-oyo w-ake ulija-a hisani cl3-heart cl3-his/her cl3-past-fill-fv kindness ‘his heart was filled with kindness’ Polish corpus examples: d/ w sercu przechowam tkliwe uczucie in heart keep(1sg fut) sentimental feeling ‘in [my] heart, I will keep the sentimental feeling’ e/ poczuła lekki niepokój w sercu felt(3f past) light anxiety in heart ‘she felt a little anxiety in her heart’ f/ serce przepełnione miała radością heart Filled had(3f past) joy ‘she had her heart filled with joy’

The above discussion has followed the tradition of interpreting the heart-locus of emotions imagery as a metonymy-based metaphor. However, it is worthwhile to consider an alternative analysis. Let us first note that the construal of the ‘heart’ (or any other body organ) as the locus of emotions is rooted in the ontological metaphor: emotions are things. This metaphor comes with a number of image schemata associated with the attributes of ‘things’, such as their quantification, qualification as positive or negative, and also their location, since ‘things’ are always located somewhere. Thus the concept ‘locus of emotions’ follows directly from the abovementioned ontological metaphor and is not a new independent concept which needs to be grasped and metaphorically construed. Once emotions are conceptualized as ‘things’, their location somewhere within the person (person’s body) follows directly from their embodied character, i.e. that they are experienced by people and have to me by Kamila Stanek and Karolina Łaszewska, respectively; all remaining data have their sources indicated.

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bodily sensations that accompany them. In this way, the conceptualization of emotions’ location has a purely metonymic basis. The choice of a body organ to represent a specific locus of emotions also operates in a metonymic fashion and involves narrowing down the ‘somewhere in the body’ location to a unique body part. Consequently, the assumed metaphor: locus of emotions is heart can be and perhaps is better formulated as the metonymy: heart for locus of emotions, provided that the concept of ‘locus of emotions’ is construed as an indispensible element of the metaphor of emotions as ‘things in the body’. The case under consideration here also complies with the definition of metaphtonymy as described by L. Goossens and, specifically, with its variant called metaphor from metonymy, cf. Goossens(2002: 368). Regardless of how the figurative ‘heart-locus of emotions’ is formally analyzed, it starts a metonymic chain which leads to various conventionalized meanings of this lexeme, constructed in appropriate contexts. The illustrative linguistic material below comes from Swahili and Polish, but very similar examples are found in other languages discussed in references mentioned earlier in this section. The initial metaphor locus of emotions is heart leads to the conventionalized figurative meaning of the lexeme ‘heart’ as a ‘container of emotions’ which then serves as a vehicle for consecutive metonymies: heart for emotions (which is an instantiation of the general schema: container for contents), as illustrated in (2a), and its subsequent specification heart for specific emotions (generic for specific), which in Polish is most often interpreted similarly as in English, namely, as ‘good’ feelings like ‘compassion’ or ‘love’, but in Swahili, may have other interpretations as well, such as e.g. ‘courage’ or ‘enthusiasm’, as in (2b). Another extension comes by the metonymic association between emotions and a person experiencing them: heart for feeling person (experience for experiencer), as shown in (2c). These basic metonymic patterns can be further modified to render more subtle constructed meanings. For example, the last metonymy may be further divided to profile a person experiencing a temporary affection or a more permanent feeling, a person of certain character traits or just a ‘person’ or his/her ‘inner self’ (cf. Kraska-Szlenk 2005b for a detailed description of Swahili). (2) Metonymic chains in Swahili (S) and Polish (P) initiated by ‘heart’-‘container’ a/  heart for emotions (container for contents) S. hadithi i-na-yo-wez-a ku-gus-a m-oyo w-a w-anadamu story cl9-pres-rel- cl15-touch-fv cl3-heart cl3-gen cl2-people cl9-can-fv ‘a story that can touch a human heart’

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u-tazam-e m-oyo u-li-vyo-ungu-a 2sg-look-fv cl3-heart cl3-past-cl8rel-burn-fv ‘look how the heart is burning’ P. Krzepili serca warszawiaków uplifted(3pl-past) hearts Varsovians ‘they uplifted the hearts of the inhabitants of Warsaw’ zamysł ten rozżarza serce intention this lights(3sg past) heart ‘that intention lights a fire to the heart’ b/ heart for specific emotions (generic for specific) S. Wa-na-tu-zidi silaha, lakini ha-wa-tu-zidi m-oyo. 3pl-pres-3pl-increase weapons but neg-3pl-1pl-increase cl3-heart ‘They beat us as to the weapons, but they do not beat us as to the heart (i.e. courage).’ Baadhi y-a wa-tu hu-lege-a mi-oyo mbele some cl9-gen cl2-people hab-lessen-fv cl4-hearts before y-a dhiki lakini w-engine hu-kazan-a mpaka cl9-gen distress but others hab-strengthen-fv until wa-me-i-shind-a. 3pl-perf-cl9-win-fv ‘Some of the people soften their hearts in front of the distress, but others make an effort until they win it.’ P. nie masz serca neg have(2sg) heart ‘you have no heart (i.e. feelings or mercy)’ że mu okaże nagle serce that him show(3sg fut) suddenly heart ‘that she will suddenly show him heart (i.e. mercy)’ c/ heart for feeling person (experience for experiencer) S. M-oyo w-angu hu-w-a ha-u-pend-i ku-on-a cl3-heart cl3-my hab-be-fv neg-cl3-like-fv cl15-see-fv wa-tu wa-na-sumbuk-a cl2-people 3pl-pres-be.worried-fv ‘My heart does not like to see worried people’ Mi-oyo y-etu i-li-furahi ki-dogo. cl4-hearts cl4-our cl4-past-rejoice cl7-small ‘Our hearts rejoiced a little.’ P. serce knujące niecne zamiary heart plotting evil plan ‘the heart plotting an evil plan’

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jej młode serce odwzajemniało wielkie uczucie her young heart returned great feeling ‘her young heart returned the great feeling’

One more very common extension gradually built upon the initial ‘locus’ metaphor involves the usages of ‘heart’ (or some modification of it, as for example the English word sweetheart) in reference to a loved person, which is also used as a term of address, typically accompanied by the possessive pronoun ‘my’. Lexemes that can be used in this way can be found in numerous languages and include, for instance, the following: Polish serce and its diminutive serduszko, Spanish corazon, Swahili moyo, and Arabic qalb. A number of metonymies are at work here, ultimately deriving the concept of ‘loved one’. We can assume that the metonymy heart for specific emotions, further narrowed down to ‘love’, is used in its still narrower specification of ‘love for (specific) someone’, which consequently provides a vehicle to a target ‘loved one’ as an instantiation of the general metonymy: object of emotion for emotion. Multiple figurative meanings extended by elaborated metonymic chains have become very well entrenched in language usage and the descriptions of ‘heart’ in various languages agree that the text frequencies of all figurative uses of this lexeme considerably outnumber its uses in the meaning of the body organ. For example, in my own corpus study conducted on the data of 774 uses of the word moyo (including 55 uses of the plural mioyo) in Swahili (KraskaSzlenk 2005b), only eight uses referring to the human body organ were found, which amounts to approximately one percent of all uses (apart from two other uses for the metonymic ‘chest’ and the animal ‘heart’, respectively). In addition, the physical aspect of heartbeat was mentioned 48 times (6.2%), but this was typically in the context of experiencing emotions, hence it also connoted some figurative sense. These figures have been obtained for a written corpus and the uses of bodily meanings increase in oral texts, but presumably not very significantly.3 3

Visual Embodied Conceptualizations of Emotions

While the locus of emotions is figuratively associated with an inner body organ, visible body parts are conceptualized as sites of displaying emotions on 3 In Deignan and Potter’s data obtained from a mixed written-oral corpus, non-literal uses of ‘heart’ are rated at 65% (2004: 1236), which strikes me as very low. This may be due to the authors’ interpretation of literal and non-literal, which, however, is not discussed in the paper.

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the outside. Various body parts may participate in this imagery (cf. happy/sad eyes, hair rising, get under one’s skin, raise an eyebrow), but the most commonly utilized source domain is the face. The conceptualization of the face as a metaphoric “mirror” reflecting and communicating emotions relies on a very solid experiential basis, because the general look and features of the face indeed change physically and visually as people become affected by particular emotions (cf. Gibbs 2006, Vainik 2011, Wierzbicka 1999, Yu 2001, 2002). The array of facial expressions is rich and detailed which makes it possible to convey and decode from it nuances of one’s feelings, moods and attitudes. Given the fact that emotions are frequently described by reference to the bodily effects rather than directly, there are also multiple ways of linguistic metaphorical coding of the same emotions. For example, Gibbs notes that anger can be expressed as ‘a blue face’ or as ‘a reddened face’ (2006: 259). A very tight connection between emotions and looks exposed on people’s faces motivates a common metonymy: face (facial manifestations) for emotions (cf. Vainik 2011, Yu 2001). The emotions which are accompanied by clearly visible physical effects have comparable conceptualizations and wording across different languages, as for example, ‘red face’ stands for the feeling of shame or anger, or ‘white face’ for fear. The following examples of these and some other common conceptualizations come from Chinese, but similar phrases can be found in many other languages, capturing the correlation between a particular emotion and its physical manifestation on the face (cf. also Vainik 2011: 54–55 for Estonian). (3) Chinese (Yu 2002: 344) a/ lian-re (face-hot) ‘feel ashamed’ b/ lian-hong (face-red) ‘blush with shame or embarrassment’ c/ hong-lian (redden-face) ‘blush for being she; blush with anger; get angry’ d/ beng-lian (stretch-face) ‘pull a long face; look serious or displeased’ e/ ban-lian (harden-face) ‘straighten one’s face; put on a stern expression’ f/ shang-lian (up.to-face) ‘blush for drinking wine; grow dizzy with success or praise’

While it is easy to find cross-linguistic parallels in bodily metaphors of emotions, it is also common to find differences. The abovementioned Chinese expression beng-lian ‘stretch-face’ refers to a stern expression, which is fairly similar to English straight-faced ‘serious’, but quite different from Swahili kunjua uso ‘stretch face’ which is used in the meaning of smiling and being happy. The anger metaphor of ‘red eyes’ is commonly used in Swahili (macho mekundu) or in Chinese (hong-yan, Yu 2002: 346), but not as much in English or Polish. The English metaphor to have blue eyes figuratively refers to ‘sad eyes’, but in Arabic

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ʕain zarqāʔ lit. ‘blue eye’ means ‘an evil eye’. Differences of this kind are fairly frequent and expected, which is presumably due to the fact that the domain of emotions favors expressiveness which manifests itself in unusual figures of speech rather than in plain language or easily understood metaphors. Cultural differences in conceptualizations of emotions also include relative frequency and importance of particular body parts used as source domains for particular target concepts of emotions. For example, according to Occhi (cf. Occhi 2011: 180 and the references therein), experimental studies demonstrate that Japanese people recognize emotions such as happiness and unhappiness by interpreting the expression of the eyes rather than the expression of the mouth, while Americans look at the shape of the mouth as more significant than the eyes. 4

Words of Endearment and Curses

Body-part terms also serve as lexical sources for words of endearment, as well as curses. Starting with the former, particularly popular are endearment expressions with the literal meaning ‘my eye(s)’, which typically occur as terms of address for the loved ones, especially children. I assume that this one, as well as other similar expressions with body-part terms as lexical sources, are conceptualized through a metaphor of the general schema: dear person is a (particular) body part. While cases of this kind might at first give an impression of pure metaphoric mapping, since the addressed persons represent separate domains from those who address them in this fashion, the metonymic link is guaranteed through the domain of positive emotions towards the addressee, as well as by kinship relation, because prototypically this form of address is common among family members. Given below are some conventionalized examples (with literal glosses) from Polish, Swahili, Persian (Sharifian 2011: 200), Arabic as occurring in many modern varieties (see Maalej 2011 for other examples from Tunisian Arabic), Turkish and Tamil. Swahili deserves special attention for its use of the expression in singular, as well as in plural, and for having an additional conventional phrase based on another lexeme chongo, which in its bodily meaning denotes ‘one (good) eye’, i.e. the only seeing eye of a one-eyed person. Such a single eye is certainly more valuable than one eye of someone with a pair of eyes intact, by which this term of address gains in expressiveness and emotional load. Other variants of this metaphor occur with a lexeme for ‘pupil’, as in the English phrase the apple of my eye (similarly in Polish, Swahili, Persian, Turkish, etc.).

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(4) dear person is eye a/ Polish: moje ocz-ko w głowie my eye-Dim in head b/ Swahili: jicho langu; macho yangu; chongo yangu eye my eyes my eye my (of a one-eyed person) c/ Persian: Nasrin cheshm-â-m-e Nasrin eye-pl-my-is ‘Nasrin is my eyes’ d/ Arabic: (ya) ʕayni (ya) ʕayūni (vocative) eye-my (vocative) eyes-my e/ Turkish: gözüm eye-my f/ Tamil: en kaṇṇeyē my eye

Other body-part terms are also reported in some languages as words of endearment, for example, Amharic anjet ‘intestines’ or hod ‘stomach’ (Wołk 2008: 89), or Arabic kibd ‘liver’ or ra’a ‘lung’ (Rieschild 1988: 625). These uses are different from the case of the ‘heart’ being extended as a term of address discussed above, because the abovementioned organs are not conceptualized as the loci of emotions in these languages. On the contrary, both Amharic and Arabic use the concept of the figurative ‘heart’ just like English and other languages referred to earlier. Kraska-Szlenk (2009) can be seen for an analysis of cases of this kind in the larger context of expressing positive emotions; for the purpose of this chapter, it suffices to assume that these lexical sources provide relatively novel, hence more expressive variants of endearment words and replace the conventionalized body-part term ‘heart’ used as a figurative concept of the loved one. In this way, such expressions are metonymically related to other expressions rather than to the concepts which are captured by the schema: a form of one body part for a concept expressed by another body part. Alternatively, but perhaps less convincingly, it can be assumed that the abovementioned inner organs are conceptualized as ‘dear’, similarly to ‘eyes’ discussed above. Body-part terms may also serve as insults and swearwords. Vulgar names of sexual organs (as well as the anus, cf. English asshole) belong to the worst dirty words which can be used in the form of direct address, reference or curses carrying a highly expressive and abusive meaning. Due to the social taboo imposed on such terms, semantic changes affecting this part of lexicon are particularly

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fast and consist in either replacing a vulgar body-part term with a euphemism or with another body-part term (e.g. ‘back’ > ‘buttocks’). But semantic development may also take an opposite turn when a pejorative metaphoric meaning of a vulgar body-part term gets entrenched in language usage with a subsequent disappearance of the original basic meaning and consequent devulgarization of the word. For example, the common Polish adjective kiepski ‘lousy, poor’ derives from the obsolete noun kiep ‘simpleton’, which was earlier used as a derogatory term for a woman, as well as for a man acting like a woman (‘sissy’), and originally denoted the female sexual organ. Nothing of the old etymology is synchronically transparent in the pejorative, but non-vulgar word kiepski. Non-tabooized body-part terms are also sporadically used in a derogatory fashion. For example, Polish noga ‘foot/leg’ may refer to someone incompetent, inexpert in some field. Aksan (2011) points out that Turkish ayak ‘foot’ is associated with low status and is used in various expressions indicating unqualified workers or people of low class. In both these languages, the abovementioned extensions follow from the general image schema: low status is down, but they are additionally motivated by a metonymic association between unqualified jobs (as of porters, office boys) and literal walking ‘on foot’. Many other offensive expressions refer to the bodily source domain, e.g. English bonehead, numbskull, pinhead. On the basis of experimental evidence, Siakaluk et al. (2011) argue that such embodied expressions have more offensive power than other insults (e.g. idiot), because sensorimotor bodily experience influences their processing. To my knowledge, no similar study has been conducted on bodily-related words of endearment, but it is fair to hypothesize that such an effect might be found in this area, too, which could explain the high expressive and emotional value of address terms of the type ‘my eye’. 5

Language-Specific Semantic Extensions and Cultural Models

In addition to the common patterns of conceptualizations brought to attention in the previous sections, languages exhibit semantic extensions of bodypart terms which are quite unique and which manifest themselves in linguistic expressions and idioms, the exceptional structure and semantic compositionality of which cannot be found elsewhere. Such language-specific extensions predominantly arise in the domain of culture or, more specifically, in the domains of cultural behaviors, beliefs and artifacts which are unique to some linguistic community and which are not shared by others. A well-known example related to the embodiment and emotions is that of the theory of humors and the four temperaments in ancient and medieval Europe, which

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led to a system of widespread beliefs in folk culture. The theory influenced the conceptualizations of emotions (cf. Geeraerts and Grondelaers 1995), but also many other concepts related to the domains of health and diseases, physical appearance and behavior, cf. the modern uses of such English words as spleen, bloody, phlegmatic, whose figurative senses go back to that cultural inheritance. As pointed out by many authors (e.g. Kövecses 2005, 2010), cultural interpretations may override universal tendencies conditioned by embodiment. Gaby (2008: 40) observes that Thaayorre speakers conceptualize shame by reference to body hair rising and not by reference to a flushed face as English speakers do, who in turn associate hair standing on end with terror and not shame. Embodied extensions may also differ as to their linguistic instantiations. The fact that various languages share the same body-based metaphors does not automatically mean that all of them will express these metaphors using exactly the same wording, and we expect at most similarity in this respect rather than identical glossing. Much of the language we speak is based on prefabricated, conventionalized expressions and figurative meanings are no exception here. Hilpert (2006) observes that the English phrases: keep an eye on and have an eye on are both motivated in their meaning of ‘paying attention’, but only the latter may refer to ‘wanting’, while the former may not. Such differences are expected to be found in one language as well as across languages. Unpredictable semantic change is particularly favored in expressive language whose fundamental nature consists in non-obvious collocations and compositionality. Examples of nontransparent idioms with body-part terms abound in various languages, cf. English: cost an arm and a leg, play it by ear, chin wag, shout one’s head off; Polish: wyssać z palca ‘tell a made-up story’ (lit. ‘suck out of the finger’), gumowe ucho ‘informer, telltale’ (lit. ‘rubber ear’); or Swahili kichwamaji ‘silly person’ (lit. ‘water(ly) head’), mkono wa birika ‘miser’ (lit. ‘hand/handle of the teapot’). Vulgar terms referring to intimate body parts seem to be particularly privileged in such expressive usage, at least in some cultures and languages. Polish, for example, has numerous conventionalized phrases with the word dupa ‘ass’, out of which some apparently lack any logic, e.g. dupa Jasiu i skrzypce ‘ass, Johnny and the violin’ (about something impossible/untrue), jak pół dupy zza krzaka ‘like a half-ass from behind a bush’ (about wearing non-matching clothes), rozmowa jak z dupą o północy ‘conversation as if with the ass at midnight’ (about difficulties in communication). In fact, the less logic they follow, the more expressive and humorous they seem to be, making the semantic development of such lexemes very irregular. Cognitive Linguistics has always underlined the role of culture in shaping language structure and a lot of attention has been paid to examining the ‘cultural models’ through their reflections in various linguistic expressions

64

Kraska-Szlenk

D

F

B

Figure 1

E

C

A

Embodiment—language—culture triangle (Yu 2001)

analyzed by means of conceptual metaphor and metonymy. This methodology has been successfully applied to research on lexical categories, including body-part terms, which mirror and reveal the cultural metaphors that have shaped them (see e.g. Sharifian et al. 2008, Maalej and Yu 2011). A graphic representation of the necessary connection between embodiment and culture is proposed by Yu (2001) in the form of a triangled diagram shown below and interpreted as follows. The bottom (point A) of the triangle stands for the universal knowledge of the body and its functions. The distance between points B and C represents linguistic differences between two languages, while the upper line between points D and E indicates cultural differences between the linguistic communities. Even if the cultural differences are relatively large, there will be always parallel linguistic developments triggered by embodiment and graphically represented along the line AF. Embodiment-culture connection can be conveniently investigated from a usage-based perspective involving quantitative measures. Various parameters can be considered for the purpose of a semasiological analysis of body-part terms in one language, as well as for contrastive studies, such as, for example, collocations of body-part terms with other words and their frequencies, a number of diversified linguistic expressions of a particular conceptual metaphor, or a number of different senses of a body-part term and their relative frequencies. Such quantitatively measured usage criteria determine how strongly a particular cultural model is represented in one language and show the differences and similarities among multiple languages.

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One conventional expression which reflects a certain way of conceptualization associated with a specific cultural model certainly indicates that there existed at some point of time a link between this cultural model and a linguistic community speaking the language in question. However, a single linguistic datum of this sort does not tell us much about how lively or dead the link is at the present time. But the existence of similar, less conventionalized or quite novel expressions based on the same cultural model provides a clear proof that it is still well entrenched and active in the language and in the community. The corpus data make it possible to observe language use in this respect and to distinguish between past and present cultural models within a speech community by analyzing the type and token frequencies of specific metaphors and expressions. If a particular cultural metaphor has various linguistic instantiations of different frequencies of occurrence, it most likely indicates that a cultural model is still alive, whereas even a high token frequency of one specific expression may point out only to cultural inheritance, likely to be ‘dead’ at the present time. Using such evidence, we can determine that the metaphor courage is heart is still very active in Swahili, but not in Polish, in which it has remained as a relic in limited linguistic expressions of low frequency, while diachronic evidence points out that it was much more entrenched in the past (cf. Kraska-Szlenk 2005a). At the same time, it should be pointed out that while a strong linguistic entrenchment of a certain cultural metaphor naturally correlates with its strong cultural value,4 the reverse does not have to be true, because the same cultural values may be expressed by different, alternative conceptualizations. For example, the value of work can be expressed by either of the metonymies: hand(s) for work or sweat for work. Some languages, including Polish and Swahili, have linguistic expressions instantiating both of these metaphors. But a thorough comparison reveals that the former is very well entrenched in Polish, but not in Swahili, while the latter is marginal in Polish and strongly grounded in Swahili (cf. Kraska-Szlenk 2004a,b). The evidence is based on differences in the corpus occurrences of appropriate linguistic expressions and the number of proverbs and prefabs revealing each of these metonymies, but we can also observe that a chain of further semantic extensions of the former metonymy is more elaborated in Polish than in Swahili, while Swahili has a strongly elaborated chain of extensions of the latter metonymy, which is quite absent in Polish.

4 This point has been made clear by Lakoff and Johnson (1980) with respect to many metaphors that are “lived by” American society, e.g. time is money or argument is war, and by many authors since then, including the references mentioned earlier here.

66

Kraska-Szlenk

The following diagram demonstrates yet another method of interlinguistic comparison. The diagram in (5) illustrates the proportions of corpus frequencies of particular senses of the lexeme ‘heart’ in Polish and Swahili indicating how different in fact these lexemes are in their overall semantic networks in spite of having similar extended meanings and expressions (cf. Kraska-Szlenk 2005a,c). (5) Frequencies of different senses of Polish serce and Swahili moyo ‘heart’ 40 35 30 25

Polish

20

Swahili

15 10 5 lf se

ve lo

pe

rso

na

et

lit

c.

y

ns io ot em

co

nt

ain

er

e ag ur co

in

sid

e

0

df=6, χ2=35,29, p value < 0,00001 (highly significant)

The dynamics of cultural models can also be observed in the case of language transfer within a community. Sharifian (2011) offers a thorough discussion of such cultural transfers from original Australian languages onto Australian English within the Aboriginal communities, proving without any doubt that the conceptual structures are also mapped, and not only linguistic expressions. Various languages also exhibit the adoption of cultural models through the medium of linguistic calques. Within the domain of body-part terms, the word heart has cherished the most spectacular career of this kind due to the adoption of the Christian notion of Sacred Heart as well as various other metaphorical meanings of the word ‘heart’ found in the Bible and left in their literal translations in innumerable languages. While in the Aboriginal case mentioned above, the cultural model is cross-linguistically transferred within the same community, the transfer of the cultural model in this case imposes linguistic extensions in the languages of other communities which adopt a new culture.

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Language contact provides numerous examples of calquing new phrases with a foreign cultural model embedded in them. Many of such adoptions proceed with no significant effect on a target language or culture of the community. However, it is interesting to observe that expressions based on a strong cognitive motivation seem to be adopted with an extreme ease. This can be observed in the post-communist era in Poland (after 1989), when the Polish language has been under a lot of influence of Western popular culture and under a massive attack of English in the form of various kinds of borrowing, including linguistic calques. Some English expressions with body-part terms have entered the Polish language, too, but only those which are based on transparent metaphoric and metonymic extensions. For example, the following two English expressions have been literally calqued into Polish in recent years and have become so popular that we can talk about borrowing already having taken place: Eng. have (something) at the back of (somebody’s) mind > Pol. mieć (coś) z tyłu głowy lit. ‘have (something) at the back of the head’, Eng. butterflies in the stomach> Pol. motyle w brzuchu (as in English). Non-transparent English idioms, such as, for example, to cost an arm and a leg, to have a leg up (on somebody), are not calqued and there is no indication that they will be. The reason for that is quite straightforward: neither universal conceptualization nor cultural reasons provide a mechanism through which such idiomatic expressions could be mapped onto the linguistic structure of Polish. The modern, globalized world makes the cross-cultural transmission of conceptualization models very easy even without a direct people-to-people contact, since it has at its disposal the media of books, cinema, television, or the Internet. Still, it is worthwhile to realize that large parts of the world were globalized, or at least connected through various kinds of networks, in the past, too, facilitating the spread of human thought from one community to another. This happened in the case of the aforementioned humoral theory and its bodily metaphors which expanded within large areas of Europe and the Middle East, while the spread of Christian and Muslim religions made their embodied symbols well-known all over the world. Abbreviations 1sg, 2sg, 3sg 1st, 2nd, 3rd person singular number 1pl, 2pl, 3pl 1st, 2nd, 3rd person plural number appl applicative (applied) suffix cl noun class marker dim diminutive fut future form or prefix

68 fv gen hab loc neg past perf pres rel

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final vowel (in Swahili verbs) genitive (associative) particle habitual tense locative suffix negation word of prefix past tense form or affix perfect aspect present tense form or affix relative pronoun

References Aksan, Mustafa. 2011. “The apocalypse happens when the feet take the position of the head: Figurative uses of ‘head’ and ‘feet’ in Turkish”. In: Maaley Zouheir and Ning Yu (eds.). 241–255. Berendt, Erich A. and Keiko Tanita. 2011. “The ‘Heart’ of Things: A conceptual metaphoric analysis of heart and related body parts in Thai, Japanese and English”. International Association for Intercultural Communication Studies, vol. 20/1: 65–78. Deignan, Alice and Liz Potter. 2004. “A corpus study of metaphors and metonyms in English and Italian”. Journal of Pragmatics 36: 1231–1252. Enfield, N. J. and Anna Wierzbicka (eds.) 2002. The Body in Description of Emotion: Cross-Linguistic Studies. Special issue of Pragmatics & Cognition 10, 1/2 (2002). Gaby, Alice. 2008. “Gut feelings: Locating intellect, emotion, and life force in the Thaayorre body.” In: Sharifian, Farzad, Rene Dirven, Yu Ning and Susanne Niemeier. (eds.). 27–44. Geeraerts, Dirk and Stefan Grondelaers. 1995. “Looking back at anger: Cultural traditions and metaphorical patterns. In: John R. Taylor and Robert E. MacLaury (eds.), Language and the Cognitive Construal of the World. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 153–179. Gibbs, Raymond W. Jr. 2006. Embodiment and Cognitive Science. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Goossens, Louis. 2002. “Metaphtonymy: The interaction of metaphor and metonymy in expressions for linguistic action”. In: René Dirven and Ralf Pörings (eds.), Metaphor and Metonymy in Comparison and Contrast. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 159–174. Heine, Bernd. 1997. Cognitive Foundations of Grammar. New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press. ———. This volume. “The body in language: Observations from grammaticalization”.

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Heine, Bernd, Ulrike Claudi and Friederike Hünnemeyer. 1991. Grammaticalization: A conceptual framework. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Heine, Bernd and Tania Kuteva. 2002. World lexicon of grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hilpert, Martin. 2006. “Keeping an eye on the data: Metonymies and their patterns.” In: Anatol Stefanowitsch and Stefan Th. Gries (eds.), Corpus-Based Approaches to Metaphor and Metonymy. 123–52. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Johnson, Mark. 1987. The Body in the Mind: The Bodily Basis of Meaning, Imagination and Reason. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Kövecses, Zoltán. 2000. Metaphor and Emotion: Language, Culture and the Body in Human Feeling. Cambridge: Cambrigde University Press. ———. 2005. Metaphor in Culture: Universality and Variation. Cambridge: Cambrigde University Press. ———. 2010. “Metaphor and culture”. Acta Universitatis Sapientiae, Philologicai 2/2: 197–220. Kraska-Szlenk, Iwona. 2004a. “Leksem ręka w języku polskim w porównaniu do mkono w suahili”. In: Nina Pawlak and Zofia Podobińska (eds.), Języki Afryki a kultura. Warszawa: AGADE. 174–199. ———. 2004b. “Metaphorical uses of Swahili lexeme jasho ‘sweat’”. Studies of the Department of African Languages and Cultures 34: 43–57. ———. 2005a “Metaphor and metonymy in the semantics of body parts: A contrastive analysis”. In: Elżbieta Górska and Günter Radden (ed.), Metonymy-Metaphor Collage. Warszawa: Warsaw University Press. 157–175. ———. 2005b “The semantic network of Swahili moyo ‘heart’: A corpus-based cognitive analysis”. Studies of the Department of African Languages and Cultures 37: 47–80. ———. 2005c. “Serce w polskim i moyo w suahili w metaforach wyrażających emocje”. In: Anna Duszak and Nina Pawlak (eds.), Anatomia szczęścia: emocje pozytywne w językach i kulturach świata. Warszawa: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego. 137–146. ———. 2009. “Emotional aspects of inversion in Swahili address terms”. In: Nina Pawlak (ed.), Codes and Rituals of Emotions in Asian and African Cultures, Warszawa: Elipsa. 110–127. Lakoff, George and Mark Johnson. 1980. Metaphors We Live By. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. ———. 1999. Philosophy in the Flesh: The embodied Mind and its Challenge to Western Thought. New York: Basic Books. Maalej, Zouheir. 2008. “The heart and cultural embodiment in Tunisian Arabic”. In Sharifian et al. (eds.). 395–428.

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Maalej, Zouheir and Ning Yu (eds.). 2011. Embodiment via Body Parts: Studies from Various Languages and Cultures. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Matsuki, Keiko. 1995. “Metaphors of anger in Japanese”. In: John R. Taylor, Robert E. MacLaury (eds.), Language and the Cognitive Construal of the World. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 137–151. McPherson, Laura and Kirill Prokhorov. 2011. “The use of liver in Dogon emotional encoding”. In: Gian Claudio Batic (ed.), Emotional Encoding in African Languages. LINCOM Studies in African Languages 84. Munich: LINCOM: Europa. 38–55. Occhi, Debra J. 2011. “A cultural-linguistic look at Japanese ‘eye’ expressions”. In: Maaley Zouheir and Ning Yu (eds.). 171–193. Niemeier, Susanne. 2000. “Straight from the heart—metonymic and metaphorical explorations”. In: Antonio Barcelona (ed.), Metaphor and Metonymy at the Crossroads: A Cognitive Perspective. The Hague: Mouton de Gruyter. 195–213. Rieschild, Verna R. 1998. “Lebanese reverse role vocatives”. Anthropological Linguistics 40/4: 617–641. Sharifian, Farzad. 2011. “Conceptualization of cheshm ‘eye’ in Persian”. In: Maaley Zouheir and Ning Yuu (eds.). 197–211. Sharifian, Farzad, Rene Dirven, Yu Ning and Susanne Niemeier (eds.). 2008. Culture, Body, and Language: Conceptualizations of Internal Body Organs across Cultures and Languages. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Siahaan, Poppy. 2008. “Did he break your heart or your liver? A contrastive study on metaphorical concepts from the source domain organ in English and in Indonesian. In Sharifian, Farzad, Rene Dirven, Yu Ning and Susanne Niemeier (eds.). 45–74. ———. 2011. “Head and eye in German and Indonesian figurative uses”. In: Maaley Zouheir and Ning Yu (eds.). 93–113. Siakaluk, Paul D., Penny M. Pexman, Holly-Anne R. Dalrymple, Jodie Stearns and William J. Owen. 2011. “Some insults are more difficult to ignore: The embodied insult Stroop effect”. Language and Cognitive Processes 26/8: 1266–1294. Svorou, Soteria 1986. “On the evolutionary paths of locative expressions”. Berkeley Linguistics Society 12: 515–527. Vainik, Ene. 2011. “Dynamic body parts in Estonian figurative descriptions”. In: Zouheir Maalej and Ning Yu (eds.). 41–70. Wierzbicka, Anna. 1999. Emotions across Languages and Cultures: Diversity and Universals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wołk, Ewa. 2008. “Towards the Conceptualization of the Sphere of Interpersonal Relations in Amharic”. Warszawa: Warsaw University Press. Yu, Ning. 2001. “What does our face mean to us?” Pragmatics and Cognition 9/1: 1–36. ———. 2002. “Body and emotion: Body parts in Chinese expression of emotion”. Pragmatics and Cognition 10/1–2: 341–367. ———. 2008. “The Chinese heart as the central faculty of cognition”. In: Sharifian, Farzad, Rene Dirven, Yu Ning and Susanne Niemeier (eds.). 131–168.

Corporeal Incorporation and Extension in Dene Sųłiné (Athapaskan) Lexicalization Sally Rice Abstract Athapaskan languages support a strikingly small set of morphological stems that, historically, have been repeatedly recycled and recombined to achieve the necessary range of lexical expression. There are few mono-morphemic noun stems (most nouns being deverbal) and body-part terms are indeed amongst the simplest nouns morphologically— especially for the major part terms (‘head’, ‘hand’, ‘heart’, etc.). This paper surveys expressions in Dene Sųłiné (Chipewyan) that feature an incorporated body-part term or a body-part term being used figuratively in a referential sense. In the former case, I discuss the nature of the event types (e.g. posture, consumption, perception, ideation, emotion) and verb stems that tend to support the incorporated body-part term, the range of incorporable terms themselves, as well as the overall figurativity of the resulting constructions. In the case of extended body-part terms, I list the items that tend most often to participate in figurative body-based nominals, compounds, and nominalizations. While the productivity of body-part incorporation and figurative extension was likely never robust in the language (nor across the family), and the phenomenon is certainly associated with largely idiomatic constructions by contemporary speakers, one can see clear patterns in the composite structures featuring body-part morphemes highly reminiscent of what other, better studied, languages do. Moreover, a better understanding of these constructional frames may allow both linguists and (semi-)speakers insight into the morphological composition of some otherwise extremely opaque expressions that have long gone unanalyzed.

1

Body (Part Term) Modification in Athapaskan

Athapaskan (or Dene) languages, once spoken by small bands of huntergatherers in discontinuous regions across much of western North America, support few morphological stems (circa 1,300–2,100 per language) that, whether cognate or not, have been recycled and recombined over and over to achieve the necessary range of lexical expression in languages across the family. In any daughter language, there are only a couple hundred mono-morphemic noun stems (most nouns are deverbal) and body-part (BP) terms indeed

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi ��.��63/9789004274297_��6

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count amongst the simplest nouns morphologically, especially for the major part terms (‘head’, ‘hand’, ‘heart’, etc.), and amongst the most active derivationally, especially when incorporated into verb word complexes or extended to take on new meanings in isolation, compounds, or other types of constructions. Like kin terms, most Dene BP terms are inalienable, although terms for effluvia and what Snoek (in progress) calls body ephemera (regularly sloughed off or more temporary parts of the body such as ‘hair’, ‘wart’, ‘blister’) are not. With respect to the verb stem inventory, Athapaskan languages are renowned for featuring sets of classificatory stems that conflate semantic information about a generic event (static position, spontaneous movement, agentive handling) with information about the shape, animacy, constituency, or containment properties of a central event participant, be it subject or object. Less well known is the fact that nearly every verb stem is polysemous in this way (by essentially being a light predicate) as well as classificatory in that it often severely restricts the range of likely event participants. Only through the addition of derivational material does the completely propositional and highly polysynthetic Dene verb achieve lexical status. Amongst the thematic, locational, and adverbial prefixes that must obligatorily join agreement and TAM marking within the lexical verb word are a small set of incorporated nouns, including a subset of unpossessed body-part terms. Although BP incorporation has been addressed in the Athapaskan literature as a special case of noun incorporation (NI), it has usually been for the express purpose of arguing, on formal theoretical grounds, for the lexical versus syntactic nature of NI in Athapaskan, (cf. K. Rice 1989, Axelrod 1990, or Cook & Wilhelm 1998) or for situating Athapaskan incorporation within the Mithun (1984) typology. There has generally been little interest in the semantic nature of the constructions containing BP terms per se in Athapaskan or in the constructional nature of the resulting expressions that feature an incorporated BP term or one being used in an extended, figurative manner. In this paper, I survey expressions mainly in Dene Sųłiné (formerly known as Chipewyan; ISO 639–3: chp) that feature an incorporated BP term or a BP term being used in an extended and figurative, although still nominal way. In the former case, I discuss the nature of the event types (e.g. posture, consumption, perception, ideation, emotion) and verb stems that tend to support the incorporated BP term, the range of incorporable BP terms themselves, as well as the overall figurativity of the remaining constructions. In the case of BP term extension to new referential domains, I present the BP stems that tend most often to take on new meanings or participate in figurative compounds or nominalizations. While the productivity of BP incorporation and extension was likely never robust in the language (nor in its Dene sisters), and the

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phenomenon is certainly associated with largely idiomatic constructions by contemporary speakers, one can see clear patterns in the resulting constructions featuring BP morphemes. Moreover, these constructional frames may allow us insight into the morphological composition of some otherwise extremely opaque expressions, whose analyzability may have positive consequences for semi-speakers and learners in Dene communities working towards language revitalization. 2

An Overview of Body-Part Term Extension and Dene Word Formation

There is a rich literature from which to draw in anthropological and cognitivetypological linguistic circles pertaining to cross-linguistic patterning and variation in body-part term intension (particularly partonymic denotation) and extension across and beyond the body (cf., notably, Andersen 1978; Brown & Witkowski 1981, 1984; Wilkins 1996; Heine 1997; Majid, Enfield, & van Staden 2006; and Koptjevskaja-Tamm 2008). This long scholarly tradition exploring how body-part terms lexicalize the body and bodily function (including physiology, emotion, and ideation) and how they also extend to other referential domains and even grammaticalize to other relational domains (space, motion, action) includes two seminal studies of particular relevance here: Wilkins (1996) and Heine (1997, 2011). I briefly describe key hypotheses below before giving a short summary of Athapaskan word formation patterns for both nominals and verbs. 2.1 Lexical Tendencies in Body Part Naming Like Brown and Witkowski (1981) and others before him, David Wilkins (1996) searches for cross-linguistic tendencies of semantic change (what we could also call semantic extension leading to polysemy) in the domain of “parts of a person”. Tracking 75 BP concepts across a large number of languages, he concludes that metaphor and metonymy are differentially responsible for the most commonly attested semantic extensions or chains affecting BP naming (e.g. interfield metaphoric shifts such as ‘egg’ → ‘testicle’ or intrafield metonymic shifts such as ‘skin’ → ‘body’ → ‘person’). Although his larger aim is a better understanding of semantic shift in order to expand the list of possible cognates for purposes of proto-reconstruction across a language family, he does propose an implicational hierarchy within the BP semantic field, which could be tested both cross-linguistically and across other semantic domains. This hierarchy, presented in Figure 1, is especially relevant in the context of the present

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rice intrafield metonymic changes ‘skin’ → ‘body’

Figure 1

→

interfield metonymic changes ‘smell’ → ‘nose’

→

interfield metaphoric changes ‘spear’ → ‘penis’

→

intrafield metaphoric changes ‘anus’ → ‘mouth’

Wilkins’ (1996: 274) four classes of semantic change, ranked hierarchically, within the semantic field “parts of a person”

volume since it puts metonymy squarely alongside metaphor as a prolific, patterned, and cognitively motivated mechanism of semantic change. All four types of semantic changes are attested in Dene Sųłiné and in the expected frequencies Wilkins has hypothesized. Examples of each polysemy pattern involving BP terms are given in (1).1 I am neutral on the directionality of the metonymic changes, hence the lack of arrows in (1a–d). (1) intrafield metonymic change a. se-zi se-zi 1sg-chest 1sg-body ‘my chest’ ‘my body’ b. be-tth’éné be-tth’éné 3sg-bone 3sg-leg ‘his/her bone/skeleton’ ‘his/her leg’ interfield metonymic change c. sį-tsį ́ he-s-tsį ́ 1sg-nose impf-1sg-sniff ‘my nose’ ‘I smell (it)’ d. se-dza-gór he-s-gór 1sg-lower.leg-spear impf-1sg-spear ‘my knee’ ‘I’m forking/spearing (it)’ interfield metaphoric change e. dechéné → bį-chéné wooden.thing 3sg-stick ‘stick’ ‘his/her arm’ 1 Examples not expressly identified by language are from Dene Sųłiné and are drawn from my own fieldnotes and data provided by speakers primarily from Cold Lake, Alberta. I gratefully acknowledge my principal Dene colleagues and consultants: John Janvier, Nora Matchatis, Shirley Cardinal, Val Wood, and Bruce Starlight (Tsuut’ina).

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f. ghéze → be-ghéze egg 3sg-eggs egg(s)’ ‘his testicles’ intrafield metaphoric change g. bį-tł’á → be-ké-tł’á 3sg-butt 3sg-foot-butt ‘his/her butt’ ‘his/her sole’ h. be-tsané → be-dzaghé-tsané 3sg-excrement 3sg-ear-excrement ‘his/her shit’ ‘his/her earwax’

Wilkins’ chief concern, as well as that of many other studies on lexicalization tendencies surrounding BP terms, is on deconstructing the semantic shifts that have occurred (i) when body parts are given the names of objects (‘pinecone’ → ‘penis’), (ii) when the name of one body part extends to that of another (‘finger’ → ‘toe’), or (iii) when a bona fide body-part term extends to name an inanimate object, as in the case of partonymic reference (‘head’ → ‘head of a table’) or enters into the slip-stream of spatial marking (‘face’ → ‘in front of’). Dene body-part stems do figure in most of these semantic relexicalizations, and I give details in §5. However, there is little evidence that the healthy postpositional or directional inventories in the majority of Dene languages were ever infiltrated by body-part terminology. Thus, one typical avenue of bodypart grammaticalization—to encode spatial relations—was not taken in Athapaskan. 2.2 Grammaticalization Tendencies of Body-Part Terms Bernd Heine (1997, 2011; Heine & Kuteva 2002) has inventoried processes of semantic shift involving BP terms beyond the body proper. Unlike the concern Wilkins has for BP polysemy patterns or what we might simply call lexicalization, Heine is more concerned with the body as the lexical source of morphemes that participate in processes of grammaticalization and constructionalization. In the case of BP terms, common target domains involve spatial orientation, reflexives, and numerals for the former type of process, and verbs, prefabs, and idiomatic collocations for the latter. Heine’s (2011) more broadly construed BP conceptual transfer patterns are summarized in Table 1. As briefly noted in §2.1, Dene languages show little evidence of the type I or II grammaticalization processes shown in Table 1. Neither adpositions nor reflexive markers appear to have a BP source in Athapaskan. However, there is ample evidence that BP stems enter into larger constructions of a verbal or idiomatic nature. In §§3–4 below, I present and discuss a wide range of examples

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rice Heine’s (2011) chart of conceptual transfer patterns provided by the human body and the conceptual strategy behind each transfer type, the main source of BP terms, the linguistic process involved, and the types of resulting linguistic forms ( from grams to collocations) conceptual source

main BP concepts

I.

spatial orientation

location of specific BP

back, head, eye/face, belly, heart

II.

reference identity

certain representative BPs stand for entire human entity typical use of certain BPs associated with specific human activities BP is hypothesized centre of emotion

body, head

III. dynamic situations

IV. emotions

hand, head, knee, foot, tongue

heart, head, liver, bile, stomach

linguistic process

grammaticalization

target concepts

constructionalization

Table 1

linguistic products

adverbs, adpositions, case markers reflexive markers

verbs, idiomatic collocations

prefabs, idiomatic collocations

in which BP stems feature in full-blown relational predications, many of which remain semantically opaque to modern speakers, although they do come into clearer focus under the typological lense. 2.3 Word Formation in Athapaskan It has long been noted that Dene languages have traditionally resisted borrowing as a means of expanding the lexicon (Sapir 1921: 196). Instead, they opted historically for the recombination or reinterpretation (through metaphor and metonymy) of a small set of stems through a modest set of word-formation processes (conversion, compounding, nominalization, apposition, and incor-

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poration). Some illustrative examples from Dene Sųłiné—each involving a BP stem—of some of these hallmark Athapaskan pathways of lexicalization are given in (2). (2) a. conversion bį-la → be-la2 3sg-hand 3sg-work/partner/tip ‘his/her hand’ ‘his/her job/partner; its tip/extremity’ b. compounding be-tth’u-tthi-la 3sg-breast-head-hand/tip ‘his/her nipple’ c. nominalization de-t’a(n)-i impf-wing-nmlz ‘raptor (hawk)’ (lit. ‘the one that’s winged/the winged one’) d. apposition dene-tth’i háretł’ezi person-flesh it.comes.out.blue ‘bruise’ e. incorporation echą́-the-da gut-impf.3sg-sit.sg ‘she’s pregnant’ (lit. ‘it (baby) is gut-sitting’)

In the remainder of this paper, I will work somewhat backwards through this list of word-formation processes, moving from the deployment of BP stems in incorporated or appositive constructions to mark a range of relational predications, to the more familiar cases whereby a BP stem is used figuratively but still referentially, as with nominalizations, compounds, and simple conversions. It should be noted that Dene word formation and lexical semantics have received relatively short shrift in the Athapaskan linguistics literature at the expense of numerous analyses of verb morphology and treatments of voice/ obviation marking from various theoretical and family-specific perspectives. Nevertheless, there is ample evidence of robust polysemy and extensive

2 Note the nasal/oral allomorphy across the two possessive pronominal prefixes. Inflectional alternations in the possessive marker are often associated with, or diagnostic of, polysemous extension of the stem leading to a new lexical item.

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grammaticalization throughout the languages of the family. I contend that Athapaskan data are long overdue to take their seat at the larger typological table, especially with respect to analyses of lexicalization and grammaticalization processes involving BPs, as explored in this volume. 3

Body-Part Incorporation: A Special Case of NI in Athapaskan

Noun incorporation (NI) has been of particular theoretical interest in generative frameworks because, as a special kind of argument-structure construction, it purportedly involves the syntacticization of what otherwise would be considered a morphological process. Baker (1996) and others have used its productivity in a language as a parametric indicator of polysynthesis. Athapaskan languages have failed to hit the mark of true polysynthesism in this view since NI is a relatively frozen and vestigial part of verb morphology for the majority of the daughters (Koyukon is likely an exception). More pertinent to our purpose here are characterizations of NI that contrast it as an idiomatic and lexicalized form of expression versus an analytic and syntacticized form. Writing over a hundred years ago, Sapir (1911: 284) cut to the heart of the semantic matter, stating: The problem presents itself of when noun incorporation and when the syntactic method is used to express the object . . . it can only be suggested that what may be called typical or characteristic activities, that is, those in which activity and object are found regularly conjoined in experience (e.g., rabbit-killing, looking for a trail, setting a net), tend to be expressed by verbs with incorporated objects, whereas ‘accidental’ or indifferent activities (e.g., seeing a house, finding a stone) are rendered by verbs with independent, syntactically determined nouns. Three-quarters of a century later, Mithun (1986:35) echoes this view of NI, claiming that such expressions tend to denote “conceptually unitary activities” (again, as compared to their more analytical, independent-argument counterparts). Relatively speaking, there has been a dearth of semantically based accounts of the Athapaskan verb of the kind that Sapir and Mithun allude to above. Reichard (1951), Young & Morgan (1987), and Axelrod (1990) are notable exceptions. More often than not, the verb word is generally considered solely for its morphological properties, which I sketch ever so briefly below. By contrast, derivation into, out of, and within the verbal lexicon has not received sustained attention.

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In Dene Sųłiné, as in other Athapaskan languages, the verb word is polysynthetic in the pre-theoretical sense: it is propositional and highly inflected. Since the language is head-final, the stem appears orthographically at the right-most edge of the verb word and is preceded by a number of prefixes having both derivational and inflectional status. In the case of non-stative verbs, multiple prefix positions and functions have been theorized (cf. K. Rice 2000 and McDonough 2000 for opposing views). In (3), I present a fairly schematic rendering of this verb template, mainly to indicate the relative position of the incorporated noun (BP) stem, of concern here.3 (3) [PP—N stem– adv—O—TAM.S—CL.V stem]Dene verb word

McDonough theorizes that the Dene verb word is minimally bi-syllabic and morphologically a kind of compound of an inflected auxiliary stem and a verb stem. The auxiliary stem, TAM.S, is made up of a fused TAM and subject agreement syllable (subject marking is only overt for 1st and 2nd person). The verb stem, CL.V, is made up of a partially fused (and overwhelmingly lexicalized) voice/valency “classifier”, to use the traditional nomenclature, and a lexical stem. (The classifier may have zero realization, just to complicate matters.) Dene verb stems are notoriously suppletive and can be thought of as portmanteaus in their own right, since some convey person and TAM information in addition to contributing to the overall verbal semantics. These details need not concern us here. More to the point, the incorporated (and unpossessed) BP noun stem appears to the left orthographically of this auxiliary stem-verb stem complex, and other derivational and inflectional material may both intervene and precede the incorporated BP. To illustrate, some simple examples of incorporated BP stems with posture predicates are given in (4) and (5). (4) Tł’áresda. tł’á-res-da butt-impf.1sg-sit.sg ‘I’m resting’ 3 My personal view is that the Athapaskan verb word could more profitably be thought of as a holistic and idiomatic construction. Paradigmatic productivity is illusory and a typical verb’s inflectional regularity and analyzability are partial at best. Such a radical position that essentially lexicalizes the entire verb word might allow Athapaskan speakers and linguists the freedom to pursue other morphosyntactic and discourse-level phenomena that are more intuitively appealing to speakers and that have been largely neglected in the literature by comparison (cf. S. Rice 2006, forthcoming).

80 (5)

rice Echą́ neghestí�.̨ echą́ne-ghes-tį́ stomach/guts-impf.1sg-lie.sg ‘I’m lying on my stomach’

(5) could be taken as more literal than (4), although both suggest a “typical or characteristic activity”, as in Sapir’s view quoted above. Axelrod (1990) provides a nearly synonymous example to (5) from Koyukon, a language of Alaska that both has more prefix categories and is regarded as being a bit more inflectionally and derivationally productive than many of its Dene sisters. In the Koyukon example in (6), the incorporated BP stem and the use of a non-human posture verb stem to yield a “conceptually unitary activity”, in Mithun’s sense, or rather a social disposition associated with such humble behavior. (6) Soda kondetaanh. koyukon (Axelrod 1990: 182) So-da ko-ne-de-taanh 1sg-older.sister stomach-tam-cl-lie.sg.animal ‘my (poor, homeless) sister is staying humbly (at someone’s house)’ lit. ‘my older sister is belly-lying (like an animal)’

Posture verb stems are not the only lexical field that feature prominently in Dene incorporated BP stem constructions. The many so-called classificatory verb stems give rise to a number of expressions with incorporated corporeal terms. I suggest that the classificatory stems are really just theme-related light predicates; they help reference through shape, constituency, animacy, etc., a salient participant in some activity or interaction. In the case of the examples in (7)–(8), the ‘head’ or the ‘hand’ are construed as solid rounded objects that move (7) or are being manipulated (8). (7) Nitthírest’a. Ni-tthí-res-t’a up-head-impf.1sg-round.object.move



‘I’m getting up (from sleeping)’

(8) a. Yebąlarełʔą.

ye-bą-la-re-ł-ʔą 3’-around-hand-perf-cl-handle.round.object



‘s/he reached around it with (the) hand’

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b. Natthíghesʔą4 na-tthí-ghes-ʔą down-head-perf.1sg-handle.round.object



‘I bowed my head’

Axelrod (1990) is again the source of similar constructions in Koyukon involving incorporated BP stems in predications with classificatory verb stems. The (a) and (b) pairs in (9) and (10) contrast a synthetic, incorporated expression with an analytic, syntacticized expression, the former enjoying status as a unitary and customary activity, while the latter is regarded as an effortful activity or as highly anomalous semantically. (9) a. Beyeekkaaghestleyh. koyukon (Axelrod 1990: 192–3) be-yee-kkaa-ghe-se-ø-tleyh 3sg-in-foot-perf-1sg-cl-handle.sticklike.object ‘I stuck my foot in it’ b. Sekkaa’ beyeeghestleyh. se-kkaa’ be-yee-ghe-se-ø-tleyh 1sg-foot 3sg-in-perf-1sg-cl-handle.sticklike.object ‘I picked up my foot and put it (foot) in it’ [since foot was asleep] (10) a. Kk’onoh’eeledaał. kk’o-noh-’ee-le-daał around-eyes-impf-cl-go.pl ‘s/he’s rolling his/her eyes around’ b. *Denogh kk’o’eetdaał. de-nogh kk’o-’ee-ł-daał 3sg.own.eyes around-impf.3sg-cl-go.pl (suggests someone moving eyes around like beads on a table)

Beyond posture and classificatory verbs, simple non-classificatory verb stems that predicate concrete action can be associated with constructions featuring an incorporated BP stem. The examples in (11)–(12) describe very common and conventionalized activities in Dene Sųłiné. (11) a. Tthísts’í. tthí-s-ts’í 4 There are many examples in Dene Sųłiné of incorporated verbs with tthí- ‘head’. Others include nátthísk’ath ‘I tilted my head’, nátthíhestth’er ‘I nodded off’, and nátthíst’a ‘I shake my head’.

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head-1sg-comb ‘I’m combing my hair (lit. head)’ b. Kenaresyi ha. ke-na-re-s-yi ha foot-up-impf-1sg-raise fut ‘I will rest’ (lit. ‘I will raise my feet up’) c. Dasges. da-s-ges mouth-1sg-close ‘I shut my trap, I shut up’ d. Góresya. gór-hes-ya knee-impf.1sg-walk.sg ‘I’m kneeling’ (lit. ‘I knee-walk’) (12) a. Nániʔesther. ná-ni-ʔes-ther along-mind-impf.1sg-move ‘I’m thinking’ (lit. ‘I mind-move along’) b. Nádareltła. ná-da-re-l-tła along-mouth-impf.3sg-cl-move.fast ‘s/he talks fast’ (lit. ‘s/he mouth-moves along fast’)

The examples in (12) deserve special mention. Both expressions feature a verb stem of motion and, in both cases, the “mover” is the incorporated BP stem. In (12a), it is the ‘mind’, while in (12b) it is the ‘mouth.’ To be sure, moving minds are conventionally thinking, while moving mouths are talking. The examples in (12), as well as those involving consumption predicates in (13) and (14) below, illustrate the extension of BP terms as referential items into the relational sphere of dynamic (inter)action (à la Heine 2011, as shown in Table 1). The most typical use of a body part (hand: working/handling; foot: walking; mouth: talking/eating) pervades the meaning of the verbal construction or collocation into which it enters. The BP is the locus, after all, of the canonical activity, metonymically speaking. Athapaskan consumption predicates are frequently made up of, not a bona fide stem denoting ‘eat’ and ‘drink’ (although such specific stems are found throughout the family), but rather a classificatory verb stem denoting the entity being eaten and an incorporated BP stem denoting ‘mouth’ (cf. S. Rice

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2009). In short, a construction akin to ‘I mouth.(loc)-mush’ means something like ‘I’m eating mush.’ In such cases, the body part ‘mouth’ suggests an activity or dynamic situation typically involving the BP, such as ‘eating’, while the verb stem merely suggests the nature or identity of the edible object. The incorporated BP examples that follow in (13) and (14) from several different Dene languages clearly display what Heine (2011) terms constructionalization, resulting in (new) idiomatic collocations or verbs (the classes of semantic change labeled type III and IV in Table 1). These are not regarded as new expressions in Athapaskan; rather, they exhibit the long-standing pattern of redeploying old stems for newer purposes so widespread and robust across the family (cf. S. Rice 2012). (13) a. Sawhjich. hupa (Golla et al. 1996: 30) sa-wh-jich mouth.into-1sg-cl.handle.particles ‘I’m eating (seeds) by the handful’ b. Ndishwol. navajo (Young & Morgan 1987: 615) ndi-yish-wol mouth.circa-impf.1sg-marrow ‘I’m eating marrow’ (lit. ‘I marrow about the mouth’) c. ʔázaashjool. navajo (Young & Morgan 1987: 875) ʔá-zaa-sh-jool refl-mouth-impf.1sg-handle.noncompact.matter ‘I’m eating it (cotton candy)’ (lit. ‘I’m mouth-mushing’) (14) a. Bedháresni. be-dhá-re-s-ni 3sg-mouth-tam-1sg-move.hand ‘I’m feeding him/her’ (lit. ‘I move (my) hand into 3sg mouth’) b. Miłxosa:y’an. hupa (Golla et al. 1996: 73) mił-xo-sa:-y’an with.it-mouth.into-1sg-handle.round.object (RO) ‘I poisoned him/her’ (lit. ‘I put RO (pill) into (3sg) mouth’)

To round out this section on idiomatic verbal constructions featuring an incorporated BP stem, we examine two expressions in Dene Sųłiné from the domains of perception and emotion. In (15) are a pair exhibiting visual and auditory perception, respectively. The incorporated BP expression—or, more precisely, an incorporated PP containing a BP term—is found in (15b), built upon the same constructional schema as (15a):

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(15) a. Hóst’i híle. hó-s-t’i híle areal-impf.1sg-perceive neg ‘I’m blind’ (lit. ‘I don’t/can’t see’) b. Dziyóst’i híle. dza-yé-hó-s-t’i híle ear-in-areal-impf.1sg-perceive neg ‘I’m deaf/I can’t hear’ (lit. ‘I don’t/can’t see in my ear’)

In (16), we have an example similar to those in (12) in which an incorporated BP stem is the logical theme/figure/participant undergoing the activity predicated by the verb stem. (16) Bek’anighidher. be-k’a-ni-ghi-dher 3sg-for-mind-perf.1sg-move ‘I’m lonesome for him/her/it’ (lit. ‘I mind-moved after him/her/it’)

Whether (16) is more appropriately considered an example from the domain of emotion or ideation is immaterial. We will examine a host of expressions in the next section that illustrate Heine’s type IV class of semantic change (cf. Table 1) involving the hypothesized centre of emotion (and ideation) involving ‘heart’ and ‘mind’. Included, too, in the next section are a wide range of constructions featuring extended uses of a BP stem, such as (i) simple conversion to a verb stem, (ii) anatomical metonymies involving missing or afflicted body parts that lexicalize as permanent or temporary physiological conditions, and (iii) typologically familiar extensions whereby the heart stands as the seat of emotion and the mind as the seat of personality, attitude, or ideation. These cases all share the hallmark “linguistic product” that Heine identifies in Table 1; through processes of constructionalization, they create verbal idioms, collocations, or prefabs. In short, they periphrastically marshal and combine lexical and grammatical material for greater expressive effect. 4

Body-Part Extension for Relational Purposes

4.1 Body Parts Extending to Body Action Perhaps the most striking type of semantic extension involving BP terms involves the wholesale conversion of a BP noun stem into a cognate verb stem. While the examples in my Dene Sųłiné database are not extensive, the two I

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have are clear and seemingly well motivated. They also suggest, à la Wilkins (1996), strategies for pan-Athapaskan comparison since many non-BP monosyllabic stems do get realized as both nouns and verbs across the family. In the (a) expressions in (17) and (18), one finds possessed BP terms in their “modal” nominal guise. The (b) expressions feature verb stems that are likely cognate with their nominal counterparts. (17) a. seké se-ké 1sg-foot5 ‘my foot’ b. Náské ha. nás-ké ha incep.1sg-track fut ‘I will track him/her/it’ (lit. ‘I will set out footing (it)’) (18) a. sedhá se-dhá 1sg-mouth ‘my mouth’ b. Łué hesdak. łué hes-dak fish impf.1sg-devour6 ‘I’m devouring the fish’ (lit. ‘I’m mouthing the fish’)

4.2 Missing/Affected Body Parts Extending to Body Affliction It is quite common for a BP term—an item that in its basic sense carries out mere anatomical and partonymic reference—to enter into a construction that suggests some kind of illness, affliction, or temporary physiological condition either localized to the function associated with that BP or generalized to describe the state of the organism as a whole. The examples in (19) are technically postpositional phrases and so might be considered relational. Just as adpositions serve to locate or predicate the presence of a referent object in space or time or, more metaphorically, in some manner or state, the absence of a referent object can have the same effect. The expressions in (19) suggest that 5 The form in (17a) also means ‘my shoe’ or ‘my footprint’. See §5.1 for similar examples and discussion. 6  This verb stem usually predicates uncontrolled consumption by a wild animal. The use of (18b) suggests that the speaker is completely gobbling up the fish. Normal, controlled human consumption would invoke a different verb stem and a different syntax.

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the absence of a body part means the absence of its associated function. In a sense, these are double metonymies since the functional absence also stands for the general condition of which lack of function is a part. Note that none of the BP terms in (19) is possessed, in keeping with the idiomatic nature of the resulting construction. (19) a. naghedį b. dziedį c. dzádį naghe-dį dzie-dį dzá-dį eye-without ear-without leg-without ‘blindness’ ‘deafness’ ‘paralysis’

In (20), one finds two phrasal (if not appositive) constructions whereby the possessed BP term is the logical subject (20a) or location (20b) of the overall predication. Although the relationship between the body part and the entire person is a clear metonymy, the relationship between the particular predicated state of the body part and the more global inferred state of the person is not so straightforward, at least not without the English gloss. Thus, as Heine (2011) proposes, the resulting expression may be a highly idiomatic collocation. (20) a. Sedzie hįdhų. se-dzie hį-dhų 1sg-heart impf.3sg-be.numb ‘I’m hungry’ (lit. ‘my heart, it is numb’) b. Sedheyaghe hega. se-dhe-yaghe he-ga 1sg-throat-in impf.3sg-be.dry ‘I’m thirsty’ (lit. ‘in my throat, it is dry’)

4.3 ‘Heart’ and ‘Mind’ and Metonymies of ‘Self’ Dene Sųłiné features a number of highly conventionalized expressions built upon the two cardinal BP terms for emotion and ideation, the ‘heart’ and the ‘mind.’ The more “analytic” of these, shown in (21), involve properties predicated of someone’s heart (the subject), although the property predications themselves range from the nearly transparent (21a–f), due to their similarity to expressions in many other languages, to the more language-specific and opaque (21g–h). All are highly figurative and involve a metonymy and a metaphor simultaneously. (21) a. Bedzie netł’edh. his/her heart, it is mighty

‘s/he is determined’

Corporeal Incorporation in Dene Sųłiné Lexicalization b. Bedzie náts’er his/her heart, it is strong c. Bedzie denur. his/her heart, it is soft d. Bedzie necho. his/her heart, it is big e. Bedzie hule. his/her heart, it is absent f. Bedzie eya. his/her heart, it hurts g. Bedzie nałther. his/her heart, it shivered h. Bedzierełtth’er his/her heart, it took off

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‘s/he is courageous’ ‘s/he is humble/kind’ ‘s/he is generous’ ‘s/he is heartless’ ‘s/he heart-broken’ ‘s/he was startled’ ‘s/he got scared’

The more “synthetic” (both syntactically and semantically speaking) of these metonymies of self, shown in (22), involve either existence or location of the mind relative to the person (a–b) or the location/direction of some concept or idea vis-à-vis the person’s mind itself (c–d).7 (22) a. Ą́ nihiʔá. ą́ -ni-hi-ʔá away-mind-perf.1sg-handle.round.object ‘I’m lonesome’ (lit. ‘I moved my mind to the wild’) b. ʔenilé. ʔe-ni-íle 4–mind-neg ‘s/he’s naughty/stubborn’ (lit. ‘s/he is not-minded’) c. Sįnié. sį-ni-yé 1sg-mind-in ‘I’m happy’ (lit. ‘(it’s) in my mind’) d. Sįnik’éch’a. sį-ni-k’éch’a 1sg-mind-away.from ‘I’m disappointed’ (lit. ‘(it’s) away from my mind’) 7 The interlinearizations and morphemic glosses in (22) are only approximations since the analyzability of these expressions remain largely opaque to speakers. Nevertheless, the derivational and postpositional morphemes that are interpretable clearly conform to common orientation metaphors where out is bad and in is good (cf. Lakoff & Johnson 1979).

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The examples in (21) and (22) share the fact that two cardinal BP terms, either ‘heart’ or ‘mind,’ can stand for the person as a whole. Moreover, simple predications, be they dynamic, stative, or locational, are used to convey a permanent or temporary state of the individual. Overall, there is nothing particularly remarkable about these examples since they seem quite familiar in meaning and structure to better-known examples in major world languages. However, from a lexical-typological perspective, these data mirror common lexicalization pathways for ideation and emotion. Furthermore, from a language revitalization perspective, the fact that Dene languages reflect common patterns means that Athapaskan speakers and linguists can make better use of published accounts when facing documentary or analytical gaps in their own records. 5

Body Part Extension for Referential Purposes

We end this survey with some of the most recognizable types of semantic extension patterns whereby old lexical material takes on a new sense (conversion) or enters into new combinations (compounds) or phrasal expressions (nominalizations). In §§5.1–5.3, I briefly present and comment upon some very clear and unambiguous examples of each of these word-formation patterns using some “cardinal” BP stems in Dene Sųłiné. In §5.4, I list some striking examples from diverse Dene languages involving BP stems and their metonymically or metaphorically inspired derivations to new content domains beyond the body. 5.1 Body Parts Converting Pure conversion is relatively rare in Athapaskan since the attendant inflectional differences between Ns and Vs are so great, as is the tendency for N stems to compound in order to signal a semantic shift. One might say that there is little tolerance for ambiguity and semantic extension tends to be coded explicitly.8 Nevertheless, Dene roots regularly surface in both nominal and verbal reflexes, with the derivation going in either direction (from N → V or V → N), as shown with some body-related stems in (23): (23) a. sįtsį → hestsį́ sį-tsį ́ he-s-tsį ́ 1sg-nose impf-1sg-sniff ‘my nose’ ‘I smell (it)’ 8 Recall the use of disambiguating nasal/oral allomorphs for the 3sg possessive pronominal prefix in (2a) to signal the two senses of the stem –la ‘hand’ vs. ‘job/helper.’

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b. delkoth → dekodhi de-l-koth de-koth-i impf.3sg-cl-cough impf-cough-nmlz ‘s/he is coughing’ ‘a cough/coughing’

With respect to BP conversion, the examples in (24) mirror those given earlier in (2a). The stem remains unchanged, although allomorphic variation in the possessive prefix underscores the semantic shift. Along the lines of Wilkins (1996), I presume that ‘chest’ is most likely the original gloss of –zi, with the additional sense of ‘body’ in (24b) representing a cross-linguistically typical metonymic shift from smaller to larger (contiguous) body part. In the case of (24c), with the nasal possessive allomorph, we see a metaphoric shift to the more abstract domain of social identity. It is not difficult to motivate the semantic shift from ‘chest’ to person’s ‘body’ or from ‘chest’, which one often taps with one’s hand when identifying oneself, to ‘name’. Whether this was a series of two stepwise shifts historically (chest → body → name) or two distinct radiating pathways from the common sense ‘chest’ (body ← chest → name) need not concern us here. (24) a. sezi b. sezi c. sįzi 1sg-chest 1sg-body 1sg-name ‘my chest’ ‘my body’ ‘my name’

A simpler example of conversion can be seen in the examples in (25)–(27). Arguably, the shift from foot to shoe (footware, or that which goes on the foot) or foot to track (that which the foot leaves behind) involves fairly straightforward metonymic associations. Nevertheless, the ‘shoe’ sense requires no possessive marker (cf. 26b–c), while the ‘track’ sense does, either through a possessive prefix or a modifying stem in a compound form (cf. 27a–c). (25) a. seké se-ké 1sg-foot ‘my foot/feet’ [also, ‘my shoe(s)’ and ‘my footprint(s)’] (26) a. deneké b. kéchogh c. késųłiné dene-ké ké-chogh ké-sųłiné person-foot foot-big foot-true/genuine ‘shoe’ ‘boot’ ‘moccasin’

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(27) a. deneké b. deneláké c. łįké dene-ké dene-lá-ké łį-ké person-foot person-hand-foot dog-foot ‘footprint(s)’ ‘fingerprint(s)’ ‘dog tracks’

A slightly more involved case of conversion is exemplified in (28). Here, a quantified (and somewhat impersonal) BP term stands for a unit of measurement, itself about the size of the named body part. (28) a. įłaghe deneké b. įłaghe denechedh įłaghe dene-ké įłaghe dene-chedh one person-foot one person-duck/thumb ‘a foot’ ‘an inch’

5.2 Body Parts Combining Stem compounding, while not the most prolific derivational pattern in Athapaskan languages, is certainly common. Both bi- and tri-morphemic compounds are found in abundance across the lexicon. BP stems figure in many such compounds, both to label other, perhaps more minor body parts, or to denote entities from other referential domains, be they indigenous concepts or terms of acculturation, as illustrated in (29)–(34). (29) a. -tth’ené -bone ‘leg/skeleton’ b. se-tthí-tth’ené 1sg-head-bone ‘my skull’ c. se-chǫ-tth’ené 1sg-stomach-bone ‘my rib(s)’ d. se-ts’a-tth’ené 1sg-hat-bone ‘my forehead’ (30) a. -la -hand ‘hand/tip’ b. se-la-tthałé 1sg-hand-awl ‘my finger(s)’ c. se-la-yué 1sg-hand-gear ‘my tool(s)’ d. tło-lá grass-hand ‘grain/wheat’ e. yoh-tthí-lá house-head-hand ‘roof (peaked)’9 (31) a. -dhéth -skin/hide ‘skin/hide/fur/cover’ b. se-na-dhéth 1sg-eye-skin ‘my eyelid’ c. se-da-dhéth 1sg-mouth-skin ‘my lip(s)’ d. se-tthí-dhéth 1sg-head-skin ‘my scalp’ 9 Compare with (2b), a compound of three body part stems (‘breast’-‘head’-‘hand’), yielding a fourth (‘nipple’).

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e. lez-dhéth urine-skin ‘bladder’ f. tsąba-dhéth money-skin ‘wallet’ (32) a. -tł’á -butt ‘butt/cheek’ b. dene-tł’á-tthén person-butt-flesh ‘buttocks/cheek’ c. dene-ke-tł’á person-foot-butt ‘sole’ d. ts’i-tł’ághe boat-butt ‘keel’ e. sekwi-tł’á-dhéth child-butt-skin/hide ‘diaper’ (33) ebądzaghejeré ebą-dzaghe-jer-é rounded-ear-rotten-nmlz ‘mushroom’ (lit. ‘rotten rounded ear’) (34) ts’ąk’áni k’oth ts’ą-k’án-i k’oth metal-burning-nmlz neck ‘stovepipe/chimney’ (lit. ‘stove neck’)

5.3 Body Parts Nominalizing Deverbal nominalizations constitute, by far, the largest source of lexicalized nouns in any Athapaskan language. The characteristically tiny stem inventory practically dictates the high incidence of nominal derivation, with the vast majority of referential entities in most languages having a relational source. This category of nominalizations partially takes us back to the incorporated BP terms inside of verb words surveyed in §3, but it also encompasses a set of modifying stative verb stems (which no longer feature TAM or agreement prefixes) combined with a possessed or unpossessed BP term. It should be noted that the nominalizing morphology is not always transparent, at least not in some of the Dene Sųłiné lexical items surveyed here; inflectional morphemes do tend to reduce phonologically as their host constructions have conventionalized semantically. In (35b) and (36b) are two examples in which the very truncated nominalized predicate enters into a construction which further elaborates the specified body part to yield a new one. (35) a. seber b. seberts’ene se-ber se-ber 1sg-belly 1sg-belly ‘my belly’ ‘my navel’

ts’į ʔane from round.nmlz

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(36) a. sela b. selagané se-la se-la gané 1sg-hand 1sg-hand dried.nmlz ‘my hand’ ‘my fingernail’

The referential constructional schema under discussion here, involving a free or incorporated noun stem within a larger nominalization, is highly prevalent across the family. It is the template for a wide range of lexicalizations denoting social roles, animals, diseases and physical conditions, sobriquets or nicknames, artifacts, and the like. It is no surprise that BP stems should show up in a large number of these predications, as sampled in (37) for an assortment of fauna names. (37) a. nultsįhi nu-l-tsį-hi ground-cl-nose/sniff-nmlz ‘skunk’ (lit. ‘the one that sniffs the ground’) b. nunié nu-ni-é ground-nostril-nmlz ‘wolf’ (lit. ‘(to the) ground-nostril-one’) c. dádzeni dá-dzen-i mouth-black-nmlz ‘loon’ (lit. ‘the black-mouthed one’) d. gu detth’eni gu de-tth’en-i bug/worm impf-bone-nmlz ‘turtle’ (lit. ‘the bug that’s boned’)

There is a small set of attributive suffixes in Dene Sųłiné (signaling, for example, color, size, age, gender, import, and value) that adhere to certain noun stems to yield a new lexical item, rather than merely a modified old one. (These suffixes all have fully predicative counterparts, in which case we should really think of them as stems in their own right.) Many of these “suffixes” show up in constructions in which they modify BP terms, resulting in some highly figurative lexicalizations for both indigenous concepts (38a–b), as well as terms of acculturation (38c).

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(38) a. ets’eze gaiaze e-ts’eze gai-aze unspec-kidney white-dim ‘chickadee’ (lit. ‘little white kidney’) b. įdzíaze į-dzí-aze unspec-heart-dim ‘strawberry’ (lit. ‘little heart’) c. denetthíaze dene-tthí-aze person-head-dim ‘postage stamp’ (lit. ‘little human head’)

5.4 Some Derivations Involving BP Stems in Other Dene Languages One of the most famous examples of BP stem conversion in the Athapaskan literature comes from Basso (1967: 471–477), who lists the source terms and target concepts behind a wholesale metaphorical mapping in Western Apache from parts of the human body to parts of an automobile or truck. A partial inventory is given in (39): (39) a. bi-ta̕ 3sg-forehead ‘windscreen’ b. bi-dáá̕ 3sg-eye ‘headlight’ c. bi-ze̕ 3sg-mouth ‘gas pipe’ d. bi-bid 3sg-belly ‘gas tank’ e. bi-yedaa̕ 3sg-chin/jaw ‘front bumper’ f. bi-gan 3sg-hand/arm ‘front wheel’ g. bi-ke̕ 3sg-foot ‘back wheel’ h. bi-ts’ǫǫs 3sg-veins ‘wiring’

Sapir (1923), in his account of the ubiquity of relativizations (nominalizations) in Athapaskan word formation, relates a couple of Dene sobriquets based on a salient body part. The examples in (40) represent a very common constructional pattern for naming or nick-naming: (40) a. tthik’edhi dene sųłiné [Sapir 1923: 136] tthi-k’edh-i head-be.bald-nmlz “Baldy” (lit. ‘the one whose head is bald’)

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b. gą k’isi navajo [ibid.: 142] gą k’is-i arm be.cut-nmlz “One-armed” (lit. ‘the one whose arm is cut (off)’)

Finally, the Tsuut’ina (Sarsi) of Southern Alberta use this same schema to name common animals (or, rather, to rename them if their traditional name has become sacred or reserved for ceremonial use) [p.c. Bruce Starlight]. In a few cases, the resulting animal name comes from a nominalization featuring a salient BP term: (41)

6

michà dikòdí tsuut’ina mi-chà di-kòd-í 3sg-tail impf-be.broad-nmlz ‘beaver’ (lit. ‘the one whose tail is broad/flat’)

Lexicalization and Revitalization

Cross-linguistic focus on such a circumscribed and universal—although, to be sure, not universally construed—domain such as body-part terms provides much theoretical traction for the emerging field of lexical typology. This paper aspires to do little more than place evidence from Dene languages alongside attested patterns described in other languages in order to bolster claims about cognitive motivation in the lexicon and grammar. Whether the Athapaskan examples reinforce or challenge hypothesized lexicalization hierarchies or grammaticalization clines remains to be seen. The data presented here, while opportunistically sampled, do strike me as representative of the family in terms of the ways in which and extent to which BP stems are exploited in lexicalization and constructionalization processes (recall that there is little evidence of Dene BP terms grammaticalizing to become adpositions, case markers, or reflexives—the type I and II changes in Table 1). However, within a particular language community, sustained attention on such a readily perceived and inherently interesting lexical domain such as body parts can reap huge documentation and pedagogical benefits, especially in endangered language communities. First and foremost among these benefits is the fact that BP terms are not obscure or overly arcane semantically. Unlike the elicitation of kinship terms, they do not suppose an underlying systematicity or require mental effort (How does my brother refer to the daughter of the brother of my mother?) and the ref-

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erents are easily (in most cases!) indicated by ostension. Consequently, they are relatively simple to collect, and even semi-speakers might feel confident in their language knowledge by being familiar with at least some BP terms. Secondly, BP terms are often part of the “endolexicon” and represent an old stratum of core vocabulary, cognitively and lexically. Thus, they often enjoy a healthy degree of cognation within a family and they can usually be successfully tracked across expressions and compared across languages. Third, BP terms provide an “easy in” to phenomena such as semantic shift, figurativity, and morphological structure in a language. They are especially useful in demonstrating possession marking and headedness in compounding. Mastering even a small degree of analyzability over complex forms can be very empowering for learners as well as for speakers who may be struggling with orthographic representations of their language or who may be considering how best to convey recurring patterns pedagogically. Finally, I have seen first hand how positively speakers and learners of endangered Aboriginal languages of Canada, including Athapaskan languages, react to morphological analysis of very concrete, but often complex lexical material as denoted by BP terms. These items constitute an especially rich semantic domain that can easily be shown to have contributed to the creation of other lexical, grammatical, and constructional expression in a language, as reported in this paper. Consequently, expressions and idioms containing BP terms are a good way to demonstrate the lexical resourcefulness of previous generations of speakers. Making past resourcefulness tangible can inspire today’s speakers to continue to coin new expressions, especially when faced with a minimal or lost inventory, in ways that are morphologically and semantically respectful of the past. Understanding traditional word formation practice and the nature of lexico-syntactic change is critical as speakers look to maintain and revitalize their obsolescing languages for future generations. Knowing the indigenous word-formation patterns can help stave off borrowing from a majority language’s vocabulary. Speakers and linguists alike have much to gain from the analytical constraint imposed by looking at a single lexical domain such as BP terms.10 One can see so readily how the same ingredients can yield different recipes (in the case of items from the same class variously re-lexicalizing, grammaticalizing, or constructionalizing within a language or when disparate paths are taken by cognate terms within a family). Moreover, more typologically minded 10

As has been successfully done for other tight lexical fields such as giving/taking verbs, posture verbs, eating/drinking verbs, breaking/cutting verbs, perception verbs, and, of course, color terms, emotions, and spatial markers. Cf. Koptjevskaja-Tamm (2008) for a fuller inventory of the ever-expanding lexico-typological literature.

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individuals can appreciate how different ingredients can get made into the same types of recipes cross-linguistically (e.g. BP terms becoming topological markers or ‘heart’-terms standing for emotions). There is much linguistic creativity emanating from such a constrained domain, just as there is much to learn conceptually about how languages change under such a strong lexical filter. An ontology of BP change will require many more small-scale, highlyfocused studies such as this in order to achieve that larger, so necessary and desired, corpus of the corporeal.

List of Works Cited

Andersen, E. 1978. Lexical universals of body-part terminology. In J. Greenberg (ed.), Universals of Human Language (Vol. 3), Word Structure, 335–368. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Axelrod, M. 1990. Incorporation in Koyukon Athapaskan. IJAL 56 (2): 179–195. ———. 1993. The Semantics of Time: Aspectual Categorization in Koyukon Athabaskan. Lincoln/London: University of Nebraska Press. Baker, M. 1996. The Polysynthesis Parameter. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Basso, K. 1967. Semantic aspects of linguistic acculturation. American Anthropologist 69: 471–477. Brown, C. and S. Witkowski. 1981. Figurative language in a universalist perspective. American Ethnologist 8 (3): 596–615. ———. 1984. Polysemy, lexical change, and cultural importance. Man 18 (1): 72–89. Cook, E.-D. and A. Wilhelm. 1998. Noun incorporation: New evidence from Athapaskan. Studies in Language 22 (1): 49–81. Golla, V. et al. 1996. Hupa Language Dictionary (2nd Edition). Hoopa: Hoopa Valley Tribal Council. Heine, B. 1997. Cognitive Foundations of Grammar. Oxford: OUP. ———. 2011. The human body as a template in the evolution of grammar. Plenary address at Body in Language: Lexicon, Metaphor, Grammar, and Culture; University of Warsaw, 21 October 2011. Heine, B. and T. Kuteva. 2002. World Lexicon of Grammaticalization. Cambridge: CUP. Koptjevskaja-Tamm, M. 2008. Approaching lexical typology. In M. Vanhove (ed.), From Polysemy to Semantic Change: Towards a Typology of Lexical Semantic Associations, pp. 3–52. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Lakoff, G. and M. Johnson. 1979. Metaphors We Live By. Chicago: Chicago University Press.

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Majid, A., N. J. Enfield, and M. van Staden. (eds). 2006. Parts of the body: Cross-linguistic categorization. Language Sciences 28(2–3): 137–360 (special issue). McDonough, J. 2000. On a bipartite model of the Athapaskan verb. In T. Fernald and P. Platero (eds.), The Athapaskan Languages: Perspectives on a Native American Language Family, 139–166. Oxford: OUP. Mithun, M. 1984. The evolution of noun incorporation. Language 60 (4): 847–894. Reichard, G. 1951. Navaho Grammar. Publications of the American Ethnological Society, Vol. 23. New York: J. J. Augustin. Rice, K. 1989. A Grammar of Slave. Berlin: Mouton. ———. 2000. Morpheme Order and Semantic Scope: Word Formation in the Athapaskan Verb. Cambridge: CUP. Rice, S. 2006. Radical construction grammar meets the Dene verb. Plenary address at the High Desert Linguistics Society meeting; University of New Mexico; 11 Nov 2006. ———. 2009. Athapaskan eating and drinking verbs and constructions. In J. Newman (ed.), The Linguistics of Eating and Drinking, 109–152. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. ———. 2012. ‘Our language is very literal:’ Figurative expression in Dene Sųłiné [Athapaskan]. In A. Idstrom and E. Piirainen (eds.), Endangered Metaphors, 21–76. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. ———. Forthcoming. Dene verb stem polysemies: Rethinking Athapaskan classificatory verbs. Sapir, E. 1911. The problem of noun incorporation in American languages. American Anthropologist 13(2): 250–282. ———. 1921. Language: An Introduction to the Study of Speech. NY: Harcourt, Brace, Javonovich. ———. 1923. A type of Athapaskan relative. IJAL 2: 136–142. Snoek, C. In progress. The lexical semantics of Athapaskan body-part, ephemera, and effluvia terms: A comparative-historical study. [PhD Dissertation, University of Alberta] Wilkins, D. 1996. Natural tendencies of semantic change and the search for cognates. In M. Durie and M. Ross (eds.), The Comparative Method Reviewed, 264–304. New York/ Oxford: OUP. Young, R. and W. Morgan. 1987. The Navajo Language: A Grammar and Colloquial Dictionary. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.

The Cow’s Body as the Source Domain of Philosophical Metaphors in the Ṛgveda: The Case of ‘Udder’ (ū́dhar) Joanna Jurewicz Abstract The Ṛgveda is a collection of poetical hymns composed in the earliest form of Sanskrit between ca the 15th and 13th centuries B.C. Its composers, the half-nomadic branch of tribes speaking Indo-European languages, gradually settled the Panjab plateau during the second millennium B.C. They mainly occupied themselves with warfare and cattle farming.  In this paper I will show how the authors of the Ṛgveda used the concepts coming from their everyday life experience to conceive abstract cosmogonic and cosmological concepts. I will use as the example the concept of cow’s udder. The general thesis is that Indian philosophy begins with deeply-embodied concepts that form the fundamental conceptual basis for its later sublime and complex metaphysical theories.

1

Introductory Remarks

The Ṛgveda is a collection of poetical hymns composed in the earliest form of Sanskrit between the 15th and 13th centuries B.C. Its composers, a halfnomadic branch of tribes speaking Indo-European languages, gradually settled the Punjab plateau during the second millennium B.C. They mainly occupied themselves with warfare and cattle farming.1 The Ṛgveda is treated by Indian tradition and Western Indology as the foundation of Indian culture in many respects but it is generally assumed that as far as philosophy is concerned we cannot trace it as far back as the Ṛgveda and that the earliest testimony of philosophical thought is preserved not until the Upaniṣads (around the 6th–5th centuries B.C.).2 I will argue, however, that in the Ṛgveda we can already find efforts to create metaphysical theories and 1 Basic information about the Ṛgveda can be found in Bergaigne (1963), Edgerton (1965), Keith (1989), Macdonell (1897), Oberlies (1998), (1999), Oldenberg (1993), Witzel (2003). 2 This opinion was strongly advocated by Frauwallner (1990, I: 85–86).

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language appropriate to convey them. What is more, these efforts lay an indispensable foundation for later Indian philosophy. Striving for the abstraction and generalisation of concepts is an important feature of any philosophical endeavour. An abstract concept can be defined as a concept that does not refer to any concrete experience. A general concept is a concept that denotes common features of objects, states or processes. In the Ṛgveda, we can find only a few concepts of this kind. These are: ‘being/truth’ (sát), ‘non-being/untruth’ (ásat) and ‘order/truth’ (ṛtá). However, it is important to note that a similar situation existed in preSocratic Greek philosophy. Here we do not have much testimony either, but even from the scanty remains we can see that a lot of philosophical concepts are to some extent connected with everyday life experience. For example, recognizing water as the first principle of the world (arche), Thales of Miletus understood it as an abstract and general concept. Nevertheless, the concept of water is not as abstract as the concepts of logos or on. The same could be said about the concept of air recognised as arche by Anaximenes of Miletus or of fire in the philosophy of Heraclitus of Ephesus.3 I will claim that a similar situation happened in the Ṛgveda and that we can find there concepts which are meant to convey abstract and general ideas although they also evoke a concrete experience. In order to reconstruct such concepts, we need an appropriate methodology provided by cognitive linguistics which assumes that people think in metonymic and metaphoric ways. In the case of metonymies, abstraction and generalisation may occur when the vehicle begins to exist independently and loses its referential function within the metonymic concept. As regards metaphors, abstract and general concepts will be concepts where the motivating character of the source domain is lost and the source domain does not need to be evoked in order to understand the target domain. In other words, the more difficult it is to activate a concept’s source domain, the more abstract and general the concept is. I am arguing that conceptual mechanisms of creation of abstract and general concepts are similar to those that underlie grammaticalization. Bybee (2002) analyses the cognitive sources of grammaticalization and shows the general features of this process: 1. phonetic reduction of words and phrases that undergo grammaticalization, 2. generalisation and abstraction of specific and concrete meanings of words and phrases that make them appropriate in a growing range of contexts, 3. higher grammaticalizing construction’s 3 Cf. Lakoff and Johnson (1999).

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frequency, and 4. complexity and duration of the grammaticalization process.4 From the point of view of the present topic, it is the second feature which is the most important and which will be investigated here.5 We can see a similarity between the processes of creation of philosophical concepts and grammaticalization in two other aspects. Firstly, both processes involve metonymic and metaphoric thinking. In her analysis of the grammaticalization of two Polish prefixes (‘na’, ‘do’), Guarddon-Anelo (2011) shows that this process involves a shift in meaning within the metonymic and metaphoric mappings, which leads to polysemy and abstraction.6 Secondly, both processes involve manipulation of the context. The crucial role of contextual motivation in grammaticalization is analysed by Heine (2002). He reconstructs the development of this scenario in the following way. In the initial stage, the context is unconstrained and the meaning of a linguistic expression is the source meaning. In the second stage, the bridging context makes it possible to infer another, more plausible meaning of an expression—the target meaning, which is nevertheless still cancellable. In the next stage, a new context—the switch context—appears that is incompatible with and rules out an interpretation in terms of the source meaning. In the final stage—conventionalisation—the target meaning does not need to be supported by the context and becomes the only meaning of linguistic expression, contradicting or violating the source meaning. This scenario can be applied to the process of creation of abstract and general concepts in the Ṛgveda. The stage of the bridging context occurs when it is possible to evoke the target meaning, but, at the same time, the source meaning is also relevant as an independent meaning of a linguistic expression. In the switch context stage, the general and abstract meaning of the target concept is imposed and the concrete meaning of the source concept, rather than being entirely bleached out, is used in conceptualisation of the target concept. In the stage of conventionalisation, the linguistic expression refers to the abstract and general target concept. The main difference between the process of grammaticalization and the process of creation of the philosophical apparatus is that the latter is guided consciously by the philosophers who compose their texts in such a way that their recipients are prompted to redefine their cultural and linguistic knowledge in order to understand the meaning. As will be shown, the aim of contextual 4 Bybee (2002: 3), cf. Heine and Kuteva (2002: 2). 5 This does not mean that other features are irrelevant but that they need a separate investigation. 6 Cf. Heine et al. (1991).

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manipulation performed by the Ṛgvedic poets was not only to evoke and redefine conventional metaphors and metonymies but also to create conceptual blends within the frames of which a linguistic expression could become as general and abstract a notion as possible. In this paper, using the example of the word ū�dhar, ‘udder’, I will show how general and abstract concepts were created in the Ṛgveda and how cognitive linguistics is helpful in their reconstruction. First, however, I need to outline the main assumptions of the Ṛgvedic metaphysical theory.7 According to the Ṛgvedic poets, cosmic processes, such as sunrise and rain, are initiated by human beings and their sacrificial activity. In the morning, fire was kindled with fire sticks, of which one was placed horizontally and the other spun vertically. The main oblation poured into the fire was the sacred juice, called sóma. The juice of sóma was prepared from a plant, bearing the same name. Its preparation was also ritualised: the plant was pressed with pressing stones, the juice was purified with aid of a woollen filter and mixed with water, milk, or clarified butter. Part of it was poured into the fire, the rest was drunk by the priests. It was believed that when the juice of sóma was poured into the fire, the sun rose. It went up, reached its zenith and there the juice of sóma was purified once again, in the heat of the solar fire. The purified juice came back to earth in the form of rain. It was also believed that the priests, exulted with sóma, rose to the zenith together with the sun and drank the heavenly juice purified there. In this way, they gained supernatural cognitive abilities that enabled them to understand everything in existence and to express it in poetry.8 Finally, it was believed that during sacrifices the gods came to earth to sit on the sacrificial grass and drink sóma with human beings. The main Ṛgvedic gods were Agni, the god of fire, Soma, the god of the sacred juice, and Indra, the god of warriors and storms. This cosmological and ritual model was never expressed explicitly in the Ṛgveda. In order to express it, the poets used complex metaphorical models which enabled them to conceive various processes in terms of activities and objects from their everyday life experience. In his Cognitive Foundations of Grammar, Heine (1997) analyses two models, zoomorphic and anthropomorphic, which serve as a structural template for orientation in space. Since farming was one of the main occupations of the Ṛgvedic people, it is not surprising that the concepts of farm animals became important source domains for metaphoric thinking. The use of the word ū�dhar is grounded in the 7 Reconstructed previously in Jurewicz (2010). 8 For other supranatural powers gained under the influence of sóma cf. Jurewicz (2010: 177) ff. All translations from the Ṛgveda are mine.

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elaboration of the zoomorphic model where the bodies of a cow and a bull serve as the structural template. As we will see, it not only serves as the template for orientation in space, but it is also used in the conceptualisation of cosmic, ritual and cognitive processes. 2

The Case Study

The lexical meaning of ū�dhar is the udder of cows: (1) ā dhenávo māmateyám ávantīr brahmapríyam pīpayan sásmin ū�dhar (1.152.6 ab) The cows which help Mamateya, the lover of the sacred word, swelled [with milk] in this udder.

Example [2] uses the word ū�dhar in its lexical meaning, but the recipient is invited to look for its other meaning: (2) ádhvaryavaḥ páyasódhar yáthā góḥ sómebhir īm pṛṇatā bhojám índram (2.14.10ab) O adhvaryu priests, fill bountiful Indra with sóma, like the udder of cow with milk.

Ū� ́ dhar is used here in the comparison, in the context which describes the ritual offering of sóma to Indra. In the Ṛgveda, there is a metonymic link between the juice of sóma and milk which was added to it. If the recipient evokes this link in the context of the example [2], he will see the rational justification of the comparison and he will conceive Indra who drinks sóma in terms of an udder filled with milk. This conceptualisation can be seen as a specific elaboration of the conceptualisation of the human body in terms of container; udder is also a kind of container for milk.9 So we can treat this example as an example of a context that may prompt the recipient to elaborate this metaphoric conceptualisation and to expand the meaning of ū�dhar with a more general one, which is a container for milk, or, to put it in even more general terms, for fluid. But the recipient does not have to think in this way in order to understand the example [2]. The literal interpretation is also meaningful. So this context can be treated as an example of what Heine (2002) calls the bridging context. However, the literal and bridging contexts of ū�dhar are less frequent in the Ṛgveda that the switch contexts and conventionalisation. I will begin with the contexts that prompt the recipient to understand ū�dhar as denoting the place where fire originates. 9 That the udder was conceived in terms of a container is shown by the fact that it can be filled with grains (cf. Ṛgveda 4.7.7).

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2.1 ū́dhar as the Birth-Place of Fire and as the Sun Let us consider the following example: (3) mātúr upásthe yád áśocad ū�dhani (3.29.14b)  . . . when it blazed up in the udder, in its mother’s womb . . .

This description can be treated as mythological. It then describes the birth of the fire god Agni conceived in terms of a living being, a calf; the conceptualisation of the gods in terms of bulls was well-entrenched in the Ṛgveda. The concept of birth is evoked via the concept of womb, upástha. The recipient is prompted to create a conceptual blend where the concepts of a cow pregnant with a calf and a cow with an udder swollen with milk are the input spaces; the third input space is the concept of fire. In the blend, the udder is the womb pregnant with a fiery embryo that is being born. The blend of udder and womb is even more strongly triggered in the example [4], where ū�dhar denotes the place of birth of the Ṛgvedic gods of rain, the Maruts, the sons of the god Rudra: (4) rudró yád vo maruto . . . vŕṣā�jani pŕśṇiyāḥ śukrá ū�dhani (2.34.2cd) . . . when Rudra, the bull, gave birth to you in the udder of the dappled cow, O Maruts . . .10

However, the description of the example [3] refers to other events too. Firstly, it refers to the ritual during which fire was kindled. In the Ṛgveda, fire sticks are conceived in terms of a bull and a cow which copulate. In this case, conceived in terms of a womb, ū�dhar denotes the place in the lower stick where fire appears. Secondly, the description of the example [3] can also be interpreted as presenting the sunrise; as I have mentioned above, the poets of the Ṛgveda believed that the sun is the cosmic form of fire. In the frames of this interpretation, cosmos is conceived in terms of a bull and a cow: the earth is a cow, the sky is a bull.11 At night they copulate in order to give birth to fire which will become the sun in the morning. The sun rises up from the earth together with the sky conceived in terms of a bull that leaves a cow after copulation. Then, ū�dhar denotes the place on earth where fire in its cosmic form appears and again the concept of udder should be blended with the concept of womb.

10

Identification of udder and womb is justified by holistic thinking which links various elements of scenario: in this case it is a calf which is born from the udder and which sucks mother’s milk from its womb. 11 Cf. Ṛgveda 4.23.10, 6.70.2.

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Thus, the mysterious production of fire from wood and the sunrise are understood in terms of milking and giving birth.12 In order to understand the dynamics of the processes that occur in the morning and the crucial links between human activity and cosmic changes, the recipient has to create a blend with the following input spaces: kindling of fire, sunrise, a cow pregnant with a calf, and milking a cow. In the blend, the former two processes are conceived in terms of two latter ones and the word ū�dhar acquires a general meaning of the place of origination of fire. In the following example the word ū�dhar is qualified as ‘heavenly’. The identification of udder and womb is justified by holistic thinking which links various elements of scenario in one. In this case it is a calf which is born and which sucks mother’s milk. (5) samudré tvā nṛmáṇā apsú antár nṛcákṣā īdhe divó agna ū�dhan | ́ tvā rájasi tasthivā�ṁsam apā�m upásthe mahiṣā� avardhan || (10.45.3) tṛtī�ye He, who has a manly mind, who has a manly glance, enkindled you in the ocean, in the waters, in the udder of the sky, O Agni. The buffaloes enlarged you in the third space—in the womb of the waters.

The way the stanza is built prompts the recipient to understand simultaneously ritual activity and cosmic processes. Firstly, ū�dhar refers to the place of origination of fire in the lower stick. However, its qualification as ‘heavenly’ prompts the recipient to think about fire in its cosmic solar form. If the recipient evokes conceptualisation of the cosmos in terms of a cow and a bull which copulate, he will identify the udder with the womb and will understand ū�dhar as the place where the fire as the sun is born. However, he may also evoke another zoomorphic interpretation of cosmos, also well entrenched in the Ṛgveda, namely, conceptualisation of the cosmos in terms of a cow. In such a case the back of the cow is the sky and its udder is fire in its cosmic form of the sun in its zenith.13 The input spaces of the blend are: kindling of fire by human beings, appearance of the morning light in the nocturnal sky, the rise of the sun up to the zenith from which it shines, a cow pregnant with a calf, and milking a cow. Thus, the recipient grasps in one insight the whole range of 12

13

It is worth noting that to conceive the appearance of fire in terms of milking is to imply that fire also has a liquid aspect. This agrees with the Ṛgvedic viewpoint according to which fire is an internally contradictory entity, not only fiery but also liquid, cf. Jurewicz (2010). I would argue that the double conceptualisation of the sky as a bull and a cow is reflected in that the Sanskrit word denoting the sky can be both masculine and feminine.

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activities and processes that occur in the morning and that can be conceived in terms of delivering the birth of a calf and milking. The word ū�dhar acquires the general meaning not only of the place where fire is born in its earthly and solar form, but also of fire in its solar zenith form. The latter usage of ū�dhar is justified on the Ṛgvedic ground by the conviction that what is born is in its essence the same as what gives birth,14 which leads to the metonymy What Is Born For What Gives Birth. Conceptualisation of the sun in terms of the udder agrees with the abovementioned Ṛgvedic conceptualisation of the sun as filled with the juice of sóma which becomes rain: the milk in the udder is the source domain for rain. The use of the word ū�dhar in reference to the sun evokes its more general meaning of a container filled with fluid (see example [2]): in the case of the sun the fluid is rain. It is also worth adding that in the Ṛgvedic Idealised Cognitive Model of milking warmth was ascribed to the udder probably because of the warmth of milk which fills it. There are stanzas which present the udder as emanating warmth to such an extent that one can heat oneself near it (example [6]); the udder is compared to fire and it is so warm that it is possible to cook an oblation on it (example [7]): (6) agníṁ ná nagná úpa sīdad ū�dhaḥ (10.61.9b) [He] sat down next to the udder like fire. (7) śrātám manya ū�dhani śrātám agnaú súśrātam (10.179.3a) I think that it is cooked in the udder, well cooked in fire. . . .

We can see then that the Ṛgvedic cultural background justifies the conceptualisation of the sun in terms of a cow’s udder filled with milk much more than ours would do. The examples given above attest that ū�dhar acquires a more general meaning of the place where the fire originates in its earthly and cosmic forms and of the sun itself seen as the cosmic form of fire. Using Heine’s terminology, we could say that we are dealing with switch contexts. It is impossible to interpret these stanzas as describing the everyday events from the life of a cowherd, so the interpretation of ū�dhar in its source meaning is ruled out and the target meanings provide the only possible interpretation. However, at the same time, in order to understand the nature of the processes expressed by the stanzas, the recipient has to evoke the source concepts connected with farming. The 14

Cf. Jurewicz (2010: 210ff). It is reflected in the popular Indian conviction that the father is reborn in his own son.

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meanings are supported not only by the specific context of the stanzas,15 but also by cultural zoomorphic models of the cosmos shared by the Ṛgvedic community (The Cosmos Is Bull And Cow, The Cosmos Is A Cow). The following two examples ([8], [9]) can be treated as examples of conventionalisation. The word ū�dhar acquires the general and abstract meaning of the place where fire is born. This meaning is not supported by the context and it is not necessary to evoke the source meaning in order to understand the target meaning: (8) síṣakti ū�dhar niṇiyór upástha (10.5.1c) He follows the udder in the womb of two hidden ones . . . (9) pitúś cid ū�dhar janúṣā viveda (3.1.9a) By his birth he found the udder of his father . . .

In example [8] the word ū�dhar refers to the place where two opposing entities, which give birth to Agni, are joined—they are not specified here; they can be kindling sticks or the earth and the sky—and called by a general term ‘hidden’ or ‘mysterious’ (niṇyá). The target meaning is incompatible with the source meaning of the word ū�dhar because it implies that both the cow and the bull have a common udder. In example [9], it is the bull that possesses an udder, which is also incompatible with the source meaning of ū�dhar. This example also expresses the appearance of fire in an abstract and general way. 2.2 ū́dhar as the Birth-Place of sóma and as the Place Reached by Exalted Human Beings Now let us consider the contexts which prompt interpretation of ū�dhar as the place where sóma is prepared: (10) sunvánti sómaṁ rathirā�so ádrayo nír asya rásaṁ gavíṣo duhanti té | duhánti ū�dhar upasécanāya káḥ || (10.76.7ac ) The pressing stones in their chariots press sóma, they milk the juice of he who looks for cows, they milk the udder in order to pour it out.16

The pressing stones are conceived here in terms of human beings: warriors in the chariots and cowherds who milk cows, the juice is conceived in terms of a cow that can be milked and of a bull lusting after cows. The stanza syncopates 15 16

Heine (2002:3). See also Ṛgveda 9.68.1.

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the long process of milking into its initial phase (udder filled with milk) and the final one (pouring of milk into a vessel), but the recipient can metonymically unfold it and understand the preparation of the juice in terms of milking. The juice is conceived in terms of milk.17 Ū� ́ dhar generally refers to the place from which sóma appears: either to the plant which is pressed or to the vessel in which the juice is prepared. In the following example drinking of sóma is presented in terms of sucking the udder: (11) . . . kásya hótur yajñáṁ juṣāṇó abhí sómam ū�dhaḥ | píbann uśānó juṣámāṇo ándho vavakṣá rṣváḥ śucaté dhánāya || (4.23.1bd) Liking the sacrifice of which priest, [would] he [come] up to sóma, the udder? He drinks the juice, greedy, delighting in it. He grew high up for the shining wealth.18

Similarly to the descriptions of the birth of fire from the udder, this description can be treated as mythological: in such a case it presents Indra (conceived in terms of a calf), who grows thanks to sóma (conceived in terms of milk). But this description also refers to the ritual during which sóma was offered to Indra who, having drunk it, manifested himself at the sacrificial place. In such a case, the vessel in which sóma is offered is conceived in terms of the udder and the udder can be identified with sóma on the basis of metonymy Container For Contents. Thus, the very abstract concept of god who accepts the oblation and is active in the ritual can be understood in the simple terms of a calf that sucks the milk from the udder of its mother. Examples [10] and [11] can again be seen as examples of the switch context. On the one hand, they aim towards a more general meaning of the word ū�dhar, which can refer to the sóma plant, to the vessel in which the juice of sóma is prepared and from which it is drunk, and to the juice itself. On the other hand, they force the recipient to activate the source meaning in order to fully understand the nature of the activities described in the stanzas. In example [12] the meaning of the word ū�dhar is built on the basis of the above-mentioned conviction that people exalted with sóma mentally travelled to the sun in order to drink the heavenly sóma there. It is also based on the zoomorphic model of cosmos:

17

18

The metonymic link which occurs between the concept of juice and of milk which is added becomes the basis for the metaphoric conceptualisation of the juice in terms of milk. Cf. also Ṛgveda 3.48.3, 9.69.1, 10.32.8.

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(12) utā�háṁ náktam utá soma te dívā sakhyā�ya babhra ū�dhani | ghṛṇā� tápantam áti sū�riyam paráḥ śakunā� iva paptima || 9.107.20 O sóma, I would like [to be] in your brown udder by night and by day for friendship with you. We flew above the sun, shining with heat, on the other side [of the world], like the birds.19

Within the zoomorphic model which conceived cosmos in terms of a cow, the sky is conceived in terms of a cow’s back, the sun in terms of its udder. The stanza calls the place reached by exulted human beings as ū�dhar but situates it not on the sun but above it. This implies that the poets in their supernatural vision could see the whole cosmos together with the sun. The stanza betrays the beginnings of the later thinking according to which the liberated human being reaches not only the edges of the world but also goes beyond it to see it in its entirety. In my opinion, the fact that this place is called ū�dhar is motivated by thinking about the sun reached in the exaltation of sóma in terms of the udder. I would treat this example as the example of conventionalisation. 2.3 ū́dhar as the Birth-Place of Rain Coming from the Sun The next examples of the switch context are the contexts that prompt the recipient to understand ū�dhar as the sun seen as the place where rain appears: (13) índra íd bhadrā� prámatiḥ sutā�vatām pūrṇám ū�dhar diviyáṁ yásya siktáya (10.100.11bc) Indra, protector of those who press sóma, to whom belongs the full heavenly udder which is to be poured . . .20

This hemistich also syncopates the process of milking but if the recipient unfolds it, he will see rain coming down from the sun in terms of milk milked from the udder. Conceptualisations of the sun in terms of the udder and raining in terms of milking is also evoked in stanza [14], which describes the activity of the Maruts, the gods of rain: (14) duhánti ū�dhar diviyā�ni dhū�tayo bhū�mim pinvanti páyasā párijrayaḥ 1.64.5cd The divine shakers milk the divine udder, they make the earth swell with milk, running around.21 Ū� ́ dhar is used in the same meaning in Ṛgveda 4.10.8. Ū� ́ dhar means the heavenly residence of sóma where it is mixed warm milk in Ṛgveda 9.71.4, 9.71.4, 9.93.3. 21 Cf. Ṛgveda 2.34.10, 6.66.1. 19 20

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It is worth pointing out that the poet calls the Maruts ‘the shakers’ (dhū�tayo). In this way, he also evokes another Ṛgvedic conceptualisation of raining as shaking a vessel filled with a liquid in order to pour out its content (The Sun Is A Vessel, Rain Is A Liquid Which Fills Vessel). If the recipient blends these two ways of thinking about raining, he will understand the sun in terms of the udder filled with milk and in terms of the vessel filled with fluid. Raining will be conceived in terms of milking a cow and shaking a vessel. Such a blending strengthens more general conceptualisation of udder as a container for a fluid. The contexts presented in examples [13] and [14] are also the switch contexts. On the one hand, ū�dhar refers here not to the real udder of a cow but to the sun. On the other, the source domain of milking endows the recipient with clear understanding of raining as caused by an agent (Natural Processes Are Deeds Of A Conscious Agent) and of nature of this process. 2.4 ū́dhar as the Place Where Thought and Speech Originate The last example of the switch context that I want to present here is the description of the appearance of speech, particularly of hymns: (15) úpa va eṣe námasā jigīṣā� uṣā�sānáktā sudúgheva dhenúḥ | samāné áhan vimímāno arkáṁ víṣurūpe páyasi sásmin ū�dhan || (1.186.4) With hope for victory I approach you with homage, O Dawn and Night, like a good milk cow, measuring song in milk of variegated colour from this udder, in the same day. (16) tisró vā�caṁ prá vada jyótiragrā yā� etád duhré madhudoghám ū�dhaḥ | (7.101.1ab) Speak three speeches preceded by light, which are milked from this udder milking honey . . .

In the Ṛgveda speech as a whole is conceived in terms of a cow,22 the words expressed in particular hymns are conceived in terms of milk, speaking is conceived in terms of milking. Examples [15] and [16] prompt the recipient to conceive speech metonymically in terms of them, thus ū�dhar refers to the speech. Ū� ́ dhar can also be metonymically used in reference to the source of thoughts and words, i.e. the mind. The motivation for this metonymy lies in the Ṛgvedic cultural background where religious thought is always expressed in poetical speech:

22 Cf. Ṛgveda 8.100.10–11.

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(17) sutambharó yájamānasya sátpatir víśvāsām ū�dhaḥ sá dhiyā�m udáñcanaḥ | bhárad dhenū� rásavac chiśriye páyo anubruvāṇó ádhi eti ná svapán || (5.44.13) Sutambhara, the real ruler of the sacrificer, who scoops from the udder of all poetic thoughts. The cow carries milk full of sap. It is stirred. He who repeats understands [this], not that one who sleeps.

The recipient of examples [15]–[17] understands that they describe creation of poetry (so the target meaning is different from the source meaning), but at the same time he is prompted to evoke the source meaning in order to understand the nature of this activity. So these are the examples of switch contexts. We can see then that the word ū�dhar is used in the contexts that evoke the Ṛgvedic cosmological, ritual, and cognitive models and thus it acquires a more general and abstract meaning. On the one hand, ū�dhar can refer to the place where life-giving elements, such as fire and sóma, the sun and rain, thought, and speech appear. On the other hand, it can refer to the sun conceived as filled with rain. The metonymies What Is Born For What Gives Birth and Contents For Container make these usages more rational. The use of the word ū�dhar in reference to the sun is motivated by the zoomorphic conceptualisation of the cosmos. The sky is conceived in terms of a cow’s body, the sun is its udder. The sky can also be conceived in terms of a bull, the earth in terms of a cow, in this case the cow’s udder is blended with the cow’s womb and it denotes the place where the sun is born. Most of these contexts are switch contexts. The target meaning is incompatible with the source meaning but the recipient has to evoke the literal meaning of ū�dhar and the whole scenario of milking a cow in order to understand the nature of the processes and activities described in the stanzas. In all these, the specific contexts support the target meaning. The usage of the word ū�dhar in reference to various entities indicates their conceptualisation in terms of a cow’s udder. However, there are also examples of conventionalisation when the source concept does not need be evoked in order to understand the meaning of an expression. In such cases, ū�dhar becomes a general and abstract term. In the process of semantic abstraction and generalisation of ū�dhar, conceptual blending plays a crucial role. 2.5 ū́dhar as a General and Abstract Term for the Source of Life-Giving Elements In example [18], ū�dhar is used in a general and abstract meaning of the source of various life-giving elements: (18) tā� tū� te satyā� tuvinṛmṇa víśvā prá dhenávaḥ sisrate vŕṣṇa ū�dhnaḥ (4.22.6ab)   These are your real, very valiant deeds: cows run ahead from the bull’s udder.

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This stanza presents the activity of the god Indra. His main deed was to kill the snake Vṛtra who enclosed various desirable goods. This deed is evoked here by the expression ‘from the bull’s udder’ (vŕṣṇa ū�dhnaḥ) because the snake Vṛtra was also conceived in terms of a bull in the Ṛgveda. Here, however, the poet prompts the recipient to create the image of an androgynous being, which is a blend of the concepts of a bull and of a pregnant cow with the udder filled with milk. In example [18] Indra frees cows, but the main good gained by Indra is water of rivers and rain. In the descriptions of this deed, the word ū�dhar is used to denote the source of rivers: (19) tuvám útsām̐ ṛtúbhir badbadhānā�m̐ áraṁha ū�dhaḥ párvatasya vajrin | áhiṁ cid ugra práyutaṁ śáyānaṁ jaghanvā�m̐ . . .  || (5.32.2a–c) You hastened the sources which were restrained at the right time, the udder of the mountain, o wielder of thunderbolt, killing the snake. . . .

So the recipient of stanza [18] can understand ū�dhar as referring to the sources of rivers freed by Indra when he kills Vṛtra, who is a mountain. If the recipient remembers that—as has been shown above—ū�dhar refers to the sun filled with rain, he will understand the stanza as expressing creation of rain. The zoomorphic model (Cosmos Is A Cow) together with conceptualisation of rain-cloud in terms of a mountain gives a coherent basis for this interpretation. We can see then that the stanza is built in such a way that it prompts the recipient to integrate various input spaces in order to understand Indra’s creative activity. This activity includes the freeing of cows that are kept in mountain caves (as was the case in ancient farming), freeing of rivers and creation of rain and these concepts constitute the input spaces of the conceptual network. At the same time this activity is conceived in mythological terms of Indra’s fight with Vṛtra and in terms of everyday experience connected with farming (milking cow and delivering the birth of a calf), which are the next input spaces of the conceptual network. This network can be enriched by further input spaces that are evoked not by the specific context of example [18] but by the conceptual background of the Ṛgveda. Since the streams of sóma in the RV are conceived in terms of cows and the pressing stones are called by the same word that is used for the mountains (ádri, áśman), the recipient may understand this description as preparation of sóma. In this case ū�dhar denotes the birthplace of sóma. If the recipient activates the chain of metonymies Cows For Udder, Udder For Warmth, Warmth For Fire, he will see that Indra also kindles fire; then ū�dhar refers to the place where fire appears. Finally, he may also evoke conceptualisation of

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speech in terms of a cow and conceptualisation of lack of knowledge in terms of a rocky hill. Then he will understand that what Indra creates is a hymn. So the recipient of example [18] is prompted to create a blend in order to understand that the activity of Indra embraces all life-giving processes that constitute the existence of the cosmos and human beings. Ū� ́ dhar becomes a general and abstract term denoting the places from which all the desirable goods come. We can see that the semantic range of the word Údhar depends on the recipient’s ability to create blends: the bigger the blend is, the more general and abstract word Údhar becomes. Some of the input spaces of the blend are evoked by the context of the stanza. Others, however, are evoked by the cultural knowledge preserved in the entire Ṛgveda via metonymic and metaphoric thinking. Example [18] can therefore be treated as partially conventionalised. The following usage of the word ū�dhar is even more conventionalised: (20) áspandamāno acarad vayodhā� vŕṣā śukráṁ duduhe pŕśnir ū�dhaḥ (4.3.10cd) Not quivering, the dappled bull which gives strength was walking. He milked the udder, the bright [milk].

Since the stanza describes an activity of fire, the target domain of ū�dhar which immediately comes to the recipient’s mind is the birthplace of fire, both on earth and in the sky. However, fire is presented here as the agent who performs milking. Thus, the recipient can evoke other meanings of ū�dhar: the place where the juice of sóma is prepared and the sun from which the rain comes. He will then see fire as preparing the sacred juice and bringing about rain. Moreover, the general character of the statement ‘he milked the bright udder’ (śukráṁ duduhe pŕśnir ū�dhaḥ) may prompt the recipient to go even further. If he activates the metaphor Speech Is Cow and Speaking Is Milking A Cow, he will understand that fire thinks and causes thinking which is expressed in speech. This agrees with the Ṛgvedic testimony which presents fire in terms of a cognising human being and according to which the agent who drinks sóma becomes heated. The recipient is again expected to create a blend so that he understands fire as the essential factor of cosmic, ritual, and cognitive processes. Ū� ́ dhar refers to all life-giving entities which appear thanks to these processes. The influence of the context on the target meaning of the word ū�dhar is even less evident in the following stanza which does not specify what kind of activity is performed by fire; only the concept of udder is evoked in the simile: (21) śúci ū�dho atṛṇan ná gávām ándho ná pūtám páriṣiktam aṁśóḥ || (4.001.19cd) He as if pierced a bright udder of cows, as if a purified juice of the stalk, which is poured around.

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I would argue that recipient is expected to evoke all the meanings of the word ū�dhar to understand the life-giving activity of fire. In this way, he will conceptually supply the target activity which is all life-giving processes—cosmic, ritual and cognitive. The examples just analysed attest the efforts of the Ṛgvedic poets to create a concept which is general and abstract and can be used in a conventional way. In order to understand examples [20] and [21], the recipient should activate the target meanings of the word ū�dhar without referring to the source concept of milking. It is worth noting, however, that there is a side-effect of the efforts aiming at abstraction and generalisation. In the Ṛgveda, there are examples of purely conventionalised usages of the word ū�dhar, but it is impossible to understand their target meaning. Here is one of them: (22) anyásyā vatsáṁ rihatī� ́ mimāya káyā bhuvā� ní dadhe dhenúr ū�dhaḥ | ṛtásya sā� páyasāpinvatéḷā mahád devā�nām asuratvám ékam || 3.55.13 She bellowed, licking the calf of another [cow]. In which world did the cow hide its udder? The oblation swelled with the milk of truth. Great is the power of the gods, unique.

There is no doubt that the stanza neither refers to everyday farming activity nor to the real cows but its exact meaning is difficult to reconstruct. Since such usages of the word ū�dhar appear more often in the Ṛgveda,23 it seems that the poets attributed a conventionalised, general and abstract meaning to this word, probably more general and abstract than I have reconstructed above. But there is no way to discover it. As we have seen above, it is the context that suggests the target meanings and the way in which they should be highlighted. The holistic meaning of ū�dhar is dynamically elaborated by the recipient thanks to the activation of metonymies and metaphors and conceptual integration. But this may lead to a situation when the meaning of the word ū�dhar becomes too general and too abstract, and when the recipient is confused as there is no indication from the context. Philosophy needs not only abstract and general terms but also unequivocal ones. I would argue that the later Indian tradition confronted this very problem, which is why the usages of the word ū�dhar, as analysed above, disappeared very soon after the Ṛgveda. Another reason was that the mode of living of Indian society had been changing; cowherding was gradually losing its importance to be replaced by other activities connected with trade, craft and urban life, so their related source domains coming from it became less meaningful. 23 Cf. Ṛgveda 5.34.3, 7.56.4, 10.20.2, 10.31.11.

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Also, the zoomorphic model of the cosmos was fully replaced by the anthropomorphic one,24 so the concept of udder lost its sense in reference to the parts and elements of the cosmos. 4

Concluding Remarks

The analysis undertaken above has shown how the Ṛgvedic poets aimed at creation of general and abstract terms which allowed them to express their theories about the world and human beings. The cognitive processes underlying these efforts are similar to those that underlie grammaticalization. The source meanings of linguistic expressions refer to everyday life experience but the expressions are used in such a way that they become detached from the experience and can be used in a general and abstract way. The word ū�dhar is used to express places of origination of various desirable goods (fire, sóma, the sun, rain, thought, and speech) and the sun itself (conceived as filled with rain). These goods are crucial for the existence of the cosmos and of human beings in cognitive and ritual dimensions and therefore the words that name them can be seen as philosophical terms. The usages of the word ū�dhar are coherent with the Ṛgvedic zoomorphic models of the cosmos conceived in terms of a cow and in terms of a bull and a cow copulating. The stanzas are composed in such a way that the recipient is prompted to integrate various input spaces in order to see in more detail the process conceived in their terms and to create as abstract and general a meaning of ū�dhar as possible. The basis for activation input spaces are conceptual metonymies and metaphors and the cultural background of the Ṛgveda. In the switch contexts, the source domains should be activated as the input spaces of the conceptual network and although the recipient focuses on the target domains, he still conceives them in terms of the source domains. The meaning of the word ū�dhar becomes conventionalised when it refers only to the target domains of metaphoric mappings. The poets deliberately create their poetry such that it may seem unintelligible at first glance and may therefore awaken curiosity. The way the recipient understands it very much depends on his knowledge and imagination. The memorisation of the Ṛgveda, which was common in an oral and storytelling culture meant that the recipient’s associations could encompass a very wide semantic range. The process analysed in the present paper is an example of conscious efforts of the Ṛgvedic poets to create philosophical concepts and an apparatus appro24

Already in Ṛgveda 10.90.

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priate to express them. By applying the methodology of cognitive linguistics I have shown that the ancient Indian thinking is not merely a kind of mythological thought governed by its inner logic but rather represents common human conceptual abilities and strategies. This is an important conclusion concerning the universality of the human thought. At the same time, if we take into consideration the fact that ancient Greek thought has almost completely lost its original form,25 the results of my research may contribute to the investigation of the beginnings of philosophical thinking seen as a general human, and not merely European, intellectual effort.26 References Bergaigne A. 1963. La religion védique d’après les hymnes du Rig-Veda. 3 vols. Paris: Librairie Honoré Champion (first edition 1878–83). Bybee, J. L. 2002. ‘Cognitive processes in grammaticalization’. In: M. Thomasello. The New Psychology of Language, volume II. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc., 145–167. Edgerton F. 1965. The Beginnings in of Indian Philosophy. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd. Frauwallner E. 1990. Historia filozofii indyjskiej. 2 vols. Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnic­ two Naukowe (translation of Geschichte der indischen Philosophie 1953). Guarddon-Anelo M. C. 2011. The Role of Metonymy and Metaphor in Grammatica­ lization: The Expression of Aspect’. Australian Journal of Linguistics, 31, 3, 211–231. Heine B. 1997. Cognitive foundations of grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ———. 2002. ‘On the role of context in grammaticalization’. In: I. Wischer, G. Diewald. New Reflections of Grammaticalisation. Amsterdam, Philadephia: Benjamins. Heine B., Claudi U., Hünnemeyer F. 1991. ‘From cognition to grammar: Evidence from African languagage’. In: E. C. Traugott, B. Heine. Approaches to grammaticalization: Focus on types of grammatical markers. Amsterdam, Philadephia: Benjamins, 149–188. Heine B., Kuteva T. 2002. World lexicon of grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Jurewicz J. 2010. Fire and cognition in the Ṛgveda. Warszawa: Dom Wydawniczy Elipsa. 25

26

Kirk et al. (1999), in their Pre-socratic Philosophy, write: ‘The authentic passages of the pre-Socratic philosophers have been preserved only in quotations, beginning with Plato of IV BC and ending with Simplicius of VI AD’ (Kirk et al. (1999), my translation). The project was funded by the National Science Center on the basis of Decision Number 2012/05/B/HS1/02955.

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Keith A. B. 1989. The religion and Philosophy of the Veda and Upanishads. 2 vols. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass (first edition: Cambridge, Massachusetts 1925). Kirk G. S., Raven J. E., Schofield M. 1999. Filozofia przedsokratejska. Studium krytyczne z wybranymi tekstami. Warszawa, Poznań: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN. Lakoff G., Johnson M. 1999. Philosophy in the Flesh. The Embodied Mind and its Challenge to Western Thought. New York: Basic Books. Macdonell A. A. 1897. Vedic Mythology. Strassburg: Verlag Von Karl J. Trübner. Oberlies T. 1998. Die Religion des Ṛgveda. Erster Teil. Das religiöse System des Ṛgveda. Wien: Institut für Indologie der Universität Wien. ———. 1999. Die Religion des Ṛgveda. Zweiter Teil. Kompositionsanalyse der Somahymnen des Ṛgveda. Wien: Institut für Indologie der Universität Wien. Oldenberg H. 1993. The Religion of the Veda. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass (translation of Die Religion des Veda 1894). Witzel M. 2003. ‘Veda and Upaniṣads’. In: G. Flood (ed.) The Blackwell Companion to Hinduism. Malden, Oxford, Carlton—Victoria: Blackwell Publishing.

Conceptualization of the Body and Self

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Our Collocating Body Parts: Recurring Images of Self and Other in the Use of English Body-Part Terms John Newman Abstract This study adopts a corpus-based approach to investigate body-part terms in English. The British National Corpus (BNC) was searched using Sketch Engine for collocates of a sample of English body-part terms: hand(s), finger(s), arm(s). The items of interest in this particular study are nominal collocates of these search terms where the collocates themselves are body-part terms, as in Rachel ran her fingers through her hair, where hair occurs as a collocate of the search term fingers. The corpus-based approach adopted here leads to an expanded view of the semantic space relevant to understanding how body-part terms interrelate beyond what can be established through purely linguistic considerations of polysemy and diachronic change. Our approach also leads to a better appreciation of the role of self vs. other in the usage of body-part terms.

1 Introduction Body-part terms constitute an attractive lexical subset in which to explore a range of ideas in lexicology, semantics, and cognitive linguistics. The biological realities of the human body mean that linguists can work with a shared understanding of the physical space underlying this semantic domain. Consequently, a cross-linguistic perspective on properties of body-part terms is relatively straightforward, making body-part terms a natural focus for typologists (cf. Koptjevskaja-Tamm’s (2008) discussion of body-part terms in her account of what constitutes “lexical typology”). The human body provides an easily imagined and universal “semantic space” in the sense of Croft (2001), against which one can explore such properties. For the most part, the linguistic research on the semantics of body-part terms can be categorized as having one of two foci, following KoptjevskajaTamm (2008): intrafield shifts of meaning or interfield shifts of meaning. The former is concerned with how the meaning of a body-part term may change to designate a different part of the body. This approach could, in turn, be an historical account of changes or a study in polysemy, in so far as polysemy reflects

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi ��.��63/9789004274297_��8

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past changes (e.g., Wilkins 1996, Koch 2008). It might include, for example, a discussion of how the concepts of ‘hand’ and ‘arm’ are subsumed by one term in a language or how the term for ‘hand’ in one language might be cognate with a term for ‘arm’ in another language. Wilkins’ (1996) research has been particularly important in this regard, systematically exploring cross-linguistic tendencies, leading to insights such as, to choose but one, how the natural direction of change is for a term referring to a visible part to come to refer to the visible whole, not vice versa. Interfield shifts refer to changes in meaning whereby a body-part term comes to have a meaning which is not simply some part of the body (see Goschler 2005 for an informative overview of such research). An interest in the conceptual mappings which relate one semantic domain, such as body parts, to another domain, such as human emotions, is most closely associated with the Cognitive Linguistic movement which has provided a comfortable framework for the analysis of metaphorical usage. A different kind of interfield shift in meaning is found in the case of grammaticalizations of bodypart terms where, say, the word for the ‘back of a human body’ comes to be used as a preposition or postposition with a meaning like ‘situated behind’. Heine (1997: 37–49), for example, offers an excellent overview of the extension of body-part terms to the deictic concepts ‘up’, ‘down’, ‘front’, ‘back’, and ‘in’, observing that body-part terms in the languages he reviews constitute the main source domain for these deictic terms. I readily acknowledge the value of these familiar approaches to the study of body-part terms outlined above. In what follows, however, I wish to explore body-part terms from a rather different perspective, one informed by more recent methodologies which fall under the rubric of corpus linguistics. Common to corpus linguistic methodologies is the interest in exploring language in use, i.e., connected spoken or written discourse, and the patterns which emerge from a systematic study of such language. As such, corpus-based approaches exemplify the idea of empirically grounded approaches to the study of language which have assumed a more central position in linguistics. Typical questions which the corpus linguist is likely to ask concern the frequency of items in a corpus and which items co-occur in close proximity in discourse, especially which items occur preferentially within a particular construction type. Questions such as these, rooted in the actualities of language use, would appear to fall outside the realm of traditional linguistic research on body-part terms. It is appropriate here to apply some corpus-based methodologies to the use of body-part terms in order to enrich the existing literature within the field. In this study, then, I adopt a corpus-based approach to investigating selected body-part terms. I use the term “corpus-based” in the sense proposed

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by Tummers, Heylen, and Geeraerts (2005), indicating an approach in which the corpus data lies at the core of the methodology and results from the corpus investigation guide the researcher in formulating insights into language. Such an approach contrasts with a “corpus-illustrated” approach in which the corpus is utilized to support a stance already determined by theoretical considerations. It should be noted that, as used by Tummers et al. (2005), “corpusbased” approaches include methods that are sometimes called “corpus-driven” approaches. My intention, furthermore, is not so much to arrive at a comprehensive set of results, but rather to discuss and illustrate some corpus-based methodologies. Consequently, I will focus on key findings, as suggested by association measures and/or frequencies. 2

Investigating Collocates

As used here, a search term refers to the string of characters or words which are searched for in a corpus and collocate refers to a word which occurs in the neighborhood of the search term(s). As simple as it may be to understand these concepts, as here defined, many valid and difficult questions arise when attempting to carry out investigations into collocates. For one thing, the notion of a word may be problematic in some languages. In English, we are accustomed to thinking about forms separated by white space or punctuation marks as equivalent to words and this serves us well in most instances. However, for some research purposes, e.g., listing collocates of a search term, one may wish to group words (in the orthographic sense) together. Big Ben, though superficially two words, functions as a compound noun and one might want these two words returned as a single collocate, on a par with clock, building etc. A second issue surrounding the investigation of collocates concerns the preferred linguistic level one chooses to work with, in particular, whether one thinks of word in the sense of a lemma or just the orthographic form. For example, when exploring a concept like the body-part term ‘hand’, are we searching for patterns involving the lemma hand (equivalent to either hand or hands, comparable to how a head word in a dictionary functions), or are we specifically searching for the form hand?1 The same applies to how we count the number of types of collocates a word has: should hand and hands count as two distinct types of collocates or merely one? A third issue concerns the span of 1 In the present study, the difference between a lemma and a word form is important. I use small caps for the lemma and italics for the word form. Thus, the noun hand refers to either hand or hands. Single quotation marks indicate the meaning: hand means ‘hand’.

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characters or words within which collocates are to be identified. Should the span cross sentence boundaries, thereby allowing both my and I in a stretch of prose like She took my hand. I suddenly felt relaxed. to be a valid collocate of hand? Or should one restrict the collocates of interest to within a sentence, in which case my, but not I, would be a collocate in this example? And even when one has settled on an appropriate set of such parameters in identifying collocates, there is the non-trivial issue of what statistical measure to use if one wishes to quantify the strength of the association between the search term and the collocate. The association strength represents the degree of attraction between two elements, typically words, based on a formula that usually takes into account, and adjusts for, the overall frequencies of the two elements. There are many such measures which could be considered, e.g., mutual information score, T-score, minimum sensitivity, etc., and it is by no means clear exactly which measure is best suited for any set of data.2 Despite the methodological issues which surround investigations of collocate behavior, as outlined in the preceding paragraph, collocates have attracted and continue to attract a good deal of attention among corpus linguists. The collocate profile of a word offers an intriguing kind of snapshot of a word’s linguistic behavior which is both novel and challenging to linguists more accustomed to the methods of structuralist linguistics. Identifying preferred collocates of some search term presupposes there is value to be had in closely observing language in usage (as opposed to language intuitions). This has not been a particular focus for many contemporary theoretical (as opposed to applied) linguists, unless one is working in such sub-fields as sociolinguistics, discourse analysis, child language, etc. Furthermore, the interest in collocates reflects a particular view about the interdependence of word and context summarized in the words of Firth: “you shall know a word by the company it keeps” (Firth 1957: 11). Firth’s understanding of word and context was not taken on board in mainstream linguistics, though one could argue that the success of corpus linguistic approaches in recent years represents, finally, a belated recognition of his insights. Regardless of how theoretical linguists approach the notion of collocates and their place in linguistic theory, investigations into collocate behavior have become routine in corpus linguistic circles, as reflected in the inclusion of options for retrieving collocates, along with options for setting the various parameters, in standard corpus linguistic tools. An excellent example of a sophisticated, large-scale exploration of collocate behavior in English is 2 Wiechmann (2008) compares 47 competing measures of association strength, which gives some idea of the abundance, i.e., confusion, of choice that the corpus linguist faces.

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Davies and Gardner (2010), a dictionary of the 5,000 most frequent lemmas of American English, along with the top 20–30 collocates for each word.3 (1) is part of the entry for the lemma hand in this dictionary, showing only the most frequent five collocates (as lemmas) in each of the three parts of speech (adjective, noun, and verb).4 A dot indicates that the head word occurs to the left of the collocate (for a dot on the left) or on the right of the collocate (for dot on the right). (1) Excerpt from the entry for hand in Davies and Gardner (2010)

adjective: noun: verb:

other, right, left, free, upper . . .  head, shoulder, arm, man, finger . . .  hold, put, shake, raise, reach . . . 

Even the truncated collocate profile displayed in (1) gives some idea of the power of this approach to understanding a word’s linguistic behavior. (1) suggests a concept which has left and right alternatives, seems closely connected to body parts such as head, shoulder, arm, and is something that we are prone to move quite a lot. (1) offers us, in other words, a snapshot of the syntactic and semantic behavior of hand. While it is not relevant here to discuss all the decisions which had to be made by Davies and Gardner in order to arrive at results like those shown in (1), it should be clear that many critical decisions are involved in any investigation of collocates. In the following section I shall review the key decisions concerning the identification of collocates relevant to the present study. 3

Methodological Preliminaries

The British National Corpus (BNC), a collection of transcribed spoken language and written texts dating mainly from 1985–1993, was chosen as the

3 A full description of the dictionary, including the details of the methodology used to establish the collocates, can be found in Davies and Gardner (2011). 4 I infer that the collocates are reported at the lemma level, rather than the word-form level, though I failed to find any explicit discussion of this point in either Davies and Gardner (2010) or Davies and Gardner (2011). Consider one of their top noun collocates for the lemma false: tooth. Given that false teeth occurs 175 times in the corpus (based on the corpus as it stands in 2011), while false tooth occurs just 5 times, it is presumably the lemma tooth which is being reported as a top collocate.

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corpus to be explored.5 It contains approximately 100 million words, about ten percent of which are taken from spoken language and the remaining ninety percent from written language. For the purposes of the present study, the corpus tool Sketch Engine was used for retrieving information on collocates (Kilgarriff et al. 2004).6 Sketch Engine provides a number of attractive features, particularly when it comes to investigating collocates in the BNC. Above all, a feature called Word Sketch leads the researcher immediately and effortlessly to exactly the kind of collocate results that are of interest in the present investigation. A Word Sketch analysis of the noun lemma hand, without the need for any specification about span to the left or to the right of the search term, yields results like those shown in Tables 1a–d. Tables 1a–d are just a small subset of the full set of tables produced by Word Sketch as a result of searching on the noun lemma hand, but they are sufficient to give the flavor of what Word Sketch can achieve. A particular virtue of these results is the categorization of the collocates by construction type such as “hand as subject of verb X”, “hand as object of verb X”, “X as object of the preposition to, in the context of hand”, etc. Results such as these bring us immediately to a level which is comfortable and informative for linguists more accustomed to working with familiar syntactic constructions. Collocates restricted in this way to particular constructions are, clearly, more linguistically “structured” than collocates simply defined by position (“three positions to the left of the search term” etc.). Furthermore, Tables 1a–d display results in a more revealing way than we find in Davies and Gardner (2010), illustrated in (1) above, where no constructional information is included with the collocates. Davies and Gardner’s dictionary informs us that shake is one of the top collocates of hand, with shake being the third most preferred verb collocate of hand in (1). But we cannot know from (1) whether hand is in a subject or object relation to shake, a difference related to quite different senses of shake, if not different lemmas. This is exactly the kind of information that Tables 1a–b provide, along with the statistical information that hand as an object of shake has a stronger association strength than as a subject. The term collostructional analysis has been applied to the study of constructionally defined collocates 5 The BNC can be accessed online at no cost through two interfaces: Mark Davies’ website at and William Fletcher’s Phrases in English site at . A full description of the BNC can be found in the Reference Guide for the British National Corpus at . 6 Sketch Engine is accessed, normally through subscription, at http://www.sketchengine .co.uk.

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Sample of Word Sketch results showing verbs with the search word hand as subject. Note that shake does not show the strongest association strength with hand as subject

hand as syntactic subject

Frequency

Association strength

tremble

88

9.06

grip

72

8.6

shake

187

8.59

slide

81

8.43

rest

88

8.17

clasp

42

8.01

caress

37

7.99

stroke

38

7.77

clutch

40

7.77

touch

69

7.6

Table 1b

Sample of Word Sketch results showing verbs with the search word hand as object. Note that shake shows the strongest association strength with hand as object

hand as syntactic object

Frequency

Association strength

shake clasp wave wash clap put rub lay lift raise

660 250 277 270 183 1280 176 322 208 417

9.74 9.12 9.06 8.87 8.71 8.57 8.43 8.17 8.17 8.15

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Table 1d

newman Sample of Word Sketch results showing objects of the preposition to, occurring in the context of the search word hand hand to X

Frequency

Association strength

forehead plough mouth cheek brow throat lip chest ear face

21 7 69 23 8 13 22 8 8 27

7.75 7.53 6.87 6.77 6.44 5.97 5.72 5.13 4.62 3.88

Sample of Word Sketch results showing objects of the preposition on, occurring in the context of the search word hand hand on X

Frequency

Association strength

hip shoulder apron knee tiller mast handle hilt arm wheel heart

110 177 17 50 11 13 17 7 144 23 35

9.64 8.44 7.71 7.49 7.49 7.41 7.05 6.99 6.98 6.55 5.47

and collexeme for the collocates within constructions (see Stefanowitsch and Gries 2003), though here I will continue to use the more traditional term collocate. Another feature of interest in these tables is the measure of association strength and it is this, rather than the raw frequency of the collocate within

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the construction type, which determines the ordering of the collocates (the higher the measure, the greater the association). Word Sketch uses its own version of the Dice coefficient, logDice, for its statistical measure of association (see Rychlý 2008 for details).7 As is typical of such association measures, higher frequency of co-occurrence does not automatically equate with higher association strength. Tables 1a-d illustrate raw frequencies of co-occurrence of words in selected contexts, along with their association strengths. Note in Table 1a, for example, that hand occurs as the subject of the verb shake more often than the verb tremble (187 vs. 88), but the co-occurrence with tremble scores higher in association strength than does shake (9.06 vs 8.59). Overall frequency of occurrence of the forms and constructions play a part in these calculations and account for such discrepancies (note that the verb lemma shake occurs 8,519 times in the BNC, while the verb lemma tremble occurs just 1,400 times). As revealing as the logDice score can be, for present purposes I will also rely on a comparison of frequencies within a construction type to make the necessary points. In part, this decision stems from a focus on behavior of collocates within a construction rather than the statistical significance of the collocate behavior with respect to the whole corpus. Table 2 is yet another kind of result provided by Sketch Engine. This is the complete set of concordance results, obtained from a direct link in the original online version of Table 2. Note that Word Sketch uses a sophisticated algorithm for identifying the object of a preposition, i.e., the head of a noun phrase within a prepositional phrase. The algorithm allows for adjectival modifiers of nouns, adverbial modifiers or adjectives, etc., to intervene between a preposition and its object. The collocating body-part noun always appears to the right of the search term in these concordance lines, but the string of words in the prepositional phrase is not simply defined by a number of words. The concordance lines serve as a check on exactly what is being reported in Word Sketch, as well as providing additional data about the context of use. Note, for example, that it is the singular hand, rather than the plural hands, which features most prominently in this construction. Note also the presence of his or her as the modifier of forehead in all but one of the examples. Within this construction at least, forehead functions as an inalienable body-part term, if we allow frequency of occurrence to help determine inalienability. These brief observations based on

7 Word Sketch includes frequencies of the construction type in its calculation of the logDice score. Consider the phrase broken arm which occurs 72 times in the BNC. The adjective broken occurs 2,756 times in the corpus and a modifier + arm construction occurs 4,184 times. The logDice score is calculated as in (i): (i) logDice = 14 + (log2((2×72)/(4184+2756))) = 8.4

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Table 2

Concordance lines for hand to . . . forehead, based on Sketch Engine

JY3 JY3 HGS HNJ H84 H8T H8T H94 AC2 AN7

see it.’ 

 She put a Guy clapped a mock-horrified is honoured.’ 

 She put a her stomach. She sat up and put a in ringlets. He touched his right ‘Oh God.’ Cunningham put a He raised his trembling He swore and clapped a his head became. He put a had disappeared, Maggie put a

BN1

completely. And if he puts his

B1X B06 G0F G0P CMJ

Father Poole raised a trembling Move your and clutching an amazed stifle a scream. She raised a looking down, the back of her

FRE FRH FR6

coffin lay. Holding her hot if crying for help. He held his Lady Ingram, holding a white

FR0

or inside her head. She lifted a

hand hand hand hand hand hand hand hand hand hand

to her forehead, frowning fiercely to his forehead. ‘Hell, not to her forehead. 

 ‘Mr to her forehead. ‘I’ll be all to his forehead, lips and chest to his forehead. ‘I treated you to his forehead and felt the to his forehead, but it was too to his forehead to ease the to her forehead and gently rubbed hand to his forehead he can feel the scars hand to his forehead. Oh God, he hands to the forehead and smoothly s hand to his forehead.  hand to her forehead and let out hand to her forehead under her dark fringe hands to her forehead she cried, hand to his forehead and loped across hand to her forehead. ‘How I have suffered hand to her forehead and felt blood and grit

Table 2 already suggest directions for further corpus-based research on bodypart terms. A final point about methodology concerns the possibility of extending an investigation into collocates based on English to other languages. At the time of writing, Sketch Engine includes 80 corpora, covering many major world languages (e.g., French, German, Spanish, Mandarin) as well as other languages (e.g., Bengali, Vietnamese, Welsh, Setswana). The Word Sketch option, the specific tool for creating Tables 1a-d, is not available for most of these corpora, but the same concordancing options are available for all these corpora, allowing

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a researcher to design cross-linguistic, corpus-based studies using a common platform for the reporting of results. 4 Self and Other The collocates of interest in this particular study are noun collocates of the noun lemmas hand, finger, and arm in the BNC. More specifically, it is the noun collocates which refer to body parts which will be investigated. Clearly, there is no shortage of such collocates to discuss—even the small sample of such results in Tables 1c-d points in a number of directions for further research. Some narrowing of focus is necessary in the face of the abundance of results that Word Sketch throws up. My decision to focus on co-occurring body-part terms is motivated in part by the discussion of body-part terms in Wilkins (1996). Wilkins revealed a number of interesting ways in which the meanings of body-part terms make connections between parts of the body (through polysemy and diachronic shift of meaning), working with dictionary ­definitions of the body-part terms. Working with corpus data, however, offers a completely different perspective on the body-part terms and might be expected to yield interestingly novel kinds of results with respect to the interconnectivity of body-part terms. The decision was made to focus on hand, finger, and arm as search terms since the body parts referred to by these words would seem, naively, to be ones which easily connect with other body parts (unlike, say, liver, tonsils, toe-nail etc.) and so offer more promise of interesting results. No attempt is being made here to be comprehensive in my discussion of collocates; rather the intention is to illustrate just some of the potential for corpusbased exploration of body-part terms. As a convenient point of departure, consider again the concordance lines in Table 2. A striking feature of these lines is that the target of the movement being described is, with just one exception, the forehead of the same person whose hand is being referred to. Whether the forehead belongs to the same ‘self’ or that of an ‘other’ can, in most cases, be ascertained just from an examination of the concordance line. One case where it is not clear is the concordance line from the BNC file B06: move your hands to the forehead. An expansion of the context confirms that in this case the forehead refers to that of a second person, an ‘other’.8 This observation leads one naturally to explore the role of 8 The line occurs in a book on aromatherapy massage with essential oils and the line describes how one carries out massage on a partner. Significantly, this example is also unusual in that

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self and other in these and similar constructions thrown up by a Word Sketch profile of collocates of selected body-part terms. Note how there is no overlap in the set of body-part terms listed in Table 1c (hand to X) and Table 1d (hand on X), even though there is quite a number of body-part terms in each table. This suggests that there will be an ample amount of data to explore in such results and that the results may well be interestingly different for different construction types. Table 3 is a sample of results with hand as the search term. I show the key word forms involved in the specific constructions. Lower case, again, refers to the specific word forms, while upper case refers to the lemma (singular or plural for nouns, present, past etc. for a verb). In this table and the following ones, I have omitted any intervening forms (e.g., his, her) between the preposition and the collocate. ‘Self’ and ‘other’ in these tables indicates whether the collocating body-part terms refer to the same person or a different person. The relative frequency of self (or other) reference is the ratio of number of the ‘self’ readings to the frequency of the specific construction. The selection of results is based upon my own choices as to what to report upon here, after scrutinizing the full results to identify the strongest patterns. All the collocates selected occur among the top 25 collocates (as lemmas) within a construction, as determined by the logDice score, and only collocates with frequencies of at least 10 are included. The examples in (2) and (3) illustrate two of these constructions reported on in Table 3, V a hand through PRO hair (where the preference is for a ‘self’ interpretation) and V PRO hand in PRO hair (where only an ‘other’ interpretation is found). (2) ‘self’ readings with hand through . . . hair a. Leila ran a nervous hand through her hair . . .  b. Scott ran a hand through his hair, bewilderment on his face . . .  c. He glowered at her, raking a lean, hard hand through his hair. (3) ‘other’ readings with hand in . . . hair a. with a grunt of triumph, he twisted his hand in her hair, jerking her head back, . . .  it involves the plural form hands, whereas in the overwhelming majority of cases in Table 2, it is the action of a person moving one of their hands to their forehead. In other words, the involvement of the self in these cases is closely tied to the action of one hand. To put it linguistically, the self-referentiality of forehead in this construction is closely tied to the use of the singular form hand, not the plural form.

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Our Collocating Body Parts Table 3

Reference to self and other in a sample of hand + prepositional phrase constructions SELF/OTHER

Relative frequency within the construction

hand through hair hands on hip hands over ears hands behind head hands on knees

self self self self self

87/90 84/86 41/41 29/31 26/26

hand on arm hand on knee hand in hair hand from shoulder

other other other other

201/201 20/22 14/14 11/11

b. Shannon fought against him as hard as she could, but his hands in her hair held her face captive . . .  c. Suddenly, she was clinging to him, her hands in his dark hair . . . 

It is worth pausing for a moment to reflect on what Table 3 and examples like those in (2) and (3) are “telling” us. Obviously, a speaker of English can construct perfectly grammatical sentences which violate the self/other preferences which are summarized in Table 3. And one can certainly imagine alternative scenarios to those implied by this table. I can imagine sliding a hand of mine through someone else’s hair and, accordingly, I would say that a fictitious sentence like I slid my hand through her hair is quite acceptable. Similarly, I can easily imagine laying my right hand on my left arm and so I can accept the possibility of a fictitious sentence like I laid my hand on my arm. The point is not that it is impossible to imagine such scenarios or that the corresponding sentences would be unacceptable. The point is, rather, that in actual usage, there are distinct preferences which are revealed in a corpus-based study and it is these usage preferences which are reported on here. In the case of hand on . . . arm, the preference in usage is unusually strong—‘other’ in 201/201 cases. Table 3 reveals the observed company of words, not the imagined company of words. The examples in (2) and (3) hint at more than just a self vs. other meaning difference. The examples in (2) concern the typically non-self-conscious action of running a hand through one’s hair as part of the expression of confusion,

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bewilderment, anxiety, etc.9 The examples in (3), on the other hand, occur as part of the description of passion, love, or other heightened emotional interaction between two people (most typically in the BNC examples, between male and female). The self vs. other distinction in these examples highlight, in fact, just one dimension of the larger situations being described; nevertheless it is a key point of difference. Something similar to what we see in (2) and (3) is found, too, in the contrast between hand on . . . knee (‘other’ in 22/23 cases) and hands on . . . knees (‘self’ in 26/26 cases). In the former construction in which only singular body-part terms are used, the reference is typically to an intimate action of one person sitting next to another person. In the latter construction, the reference is typically to an individual caught in a reflective, pensive mood. In some other cases, the preference does not represent any particular state of mind, but does reflect recurring behavior patterns, e.g., we are more in the habit of putting our hands on our own rather than someone else’s hips, and we are more in the habit of putting our hands over our own ears rather than someone else’s ears. Table 4 shows a selection of collocate results for finger. The results show the role of singular vs. plural in the collocate preferences. Notice that while it is the level of the lemma which plays a role in the finger in ear and finger to lip constructions, it is the word form where singular vs. plural is specified which plays a role in the fingers in(to) hair constructions. The contrast between the fingers in(to) hair and fingers through hair constructions is intriguing from the self vs. other point of view. The in(to) constructions consistently point to ‘other’ interpretations—in 26/26 cases, if we combine results for the two constructions. The through constructions, on the other hand, are split between ‘self’ and ‘other’ interpretations, though there is some preference for the ‘self’ interpretation. Some examples of the in(to) constructions are shown in (4). These are not results one could easily predict just from imagining possible scenarios and constructing fictional examples. The consistent use of the fingers in(to) . . . hair construction for describing interactions between self and other is particularly intriguing, reminiscent of the heightened emotional situations seen in some ‘other’ interpretations above. The more colorful, evocative verbs used in the fingers in(to) . . . hair constructions suggest this: dug her fingers . . ., 9 Another bodily action expressing bewilderment (and frustration) is lowering the head into the palm(s) of the hand, or alternatively, raising the palm(s) up to the face, leading to the recent neologisms facepalm, facepalm moment, double facepalm, triple facepalm, etc. Facepalm now has its own Wikipedia site (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facepalm) and a search on the World Wide Web quickly reveals the popularity of the terms. I am grateful to Sally Rice for alerting me to the facepalm epidemic.

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Our Collocating Body Parts Table 4

Reference to self and other in a sample of finger + prepositional phrase constructions SELF/OTHER

Relative frequency within the construction

finger in ear put finger to lip

self self

25/25 40/44

fingers into hair fingers in hair

other other

11/11 15/15

fingers through hair fingers through hair

self other

47/72 25/72

tangled her fingers . . ., sink her fingers. . . . Compare these verbs with, say, the more bland use of ran in the ‘self’ interpretations in (5). In other words, it may be more appropriate to include the specific verb as part of the distinctive collocational pattern, similar to how it is appropriate to specify a verb in the put finger to . . . lip construction. (4) ‘Other’ readings with fingers in(to) . . . hair a.   She dug her fingers in his hair convulsively and said the words which floated on top of her mind, thoughtlessly . . .  b. . . . laughter was so overwhelming that Virginia shut her eyes and tangled her fingers in the ruffled dark hair . . .  c. With a muffled sigh she slid a hand behind his head to sink her fingers into his thick hair, . . .  (5) ‘Other’ and ‘self’ readings with fingers through . . . hair a. He took his hand from her arm and slid his fingers through her hair. [other] b. He ran long fingers through his dark hair in a gesture of extreme exasperation. [self] c. ‘Oh, God!’ Rachel ran her fingers through her hair. ‘If only it were that simple.’ [self]

One further set of results to consider are those in Table 5, showing selected collocates of arm in constructions with the prepositions above, across, and around. Here, the constructions arms above . . . chest and arms above . . . head

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point to familiar bodily postures involving only the self and are most typically symmetrical in the way both arms are part of the posture. The results with around, on the other hand, involve self and other and provide a glimpse into even more specific kinds of interaction, namely routines involving malefemale interactions. In Table 5, I have added the specification ‘male’ or ‘female’ to indicate the gender associated with the use of that body-part term, even though the terms male and female do not actually occur in the text/speech. I have added the gender specification based on my own reading of each concordance line, expanded to greater context where that is necessary for disambiguation of the gender. As can be seen in the table, there is a striking imbalance in the roles played by the genders in these constructions: it is males who, overwhelmingly, have one or both arms around a female waist, while it is females who, equally overwhelmingly, have their arms around a male neck. Whether one approves of this kind of gender imbalance or not (I have not actually heard any complaints about the matter), this is what the usage facts reveal. We do not usually think of body-part terms such as arm as being so closely associated with one or the other genders and dictionary definitions of arm do not typically allude to any gender distinction in the way the word is used. Nevertheless, when one considers the context of usage in a systematic way, at a constructional level, arm and the other words entering into these constructions, such as neck, waist, etc. indeed function as a gendered body-part term. Table 5

Reference to self and other in a sample of arm + prepositional phrase constructions SELF/OTHER

Relative frequency within the construction

arms across chest arms above head

SELF SELF

30/30 33/33

male arm around female waist female arm around male waist

OTHER

37/38

OTHER

2/38

female arms around male neck male arms around female neck

OTHER

38/39

OTHER

1/39

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Collocates and Polysemy

Let us take stock of where our venture into corpus linguistics has taken us. Investigating how body-part terms collocate with each other within a range of construction types, we have found evidence for many collocate pairs, a sample of which is given in (6). (6) a. b. c. d. e. f. g.

hand—hair (cf. hand through hair) hand—hip (cf. hands on hips) hand—knee (cf. hands on knees) finger—ear (cf. finger in ear) finger—lip (cf. finger on lips) arm—head (cf. arms above head) arm—chest (cf. arms across chest)

We have explored these collocates within construction types and have seen that the number of actual tokens of such pairings within a construction type can differ. Nevertheless, they all point to familiar scenarios, either biologically or culturally determined (or some combination thereof). As such, the corpuslinguistic study of collocates of body-part terms strikes me as an interesting exercise, though here my own Cognitive Linguistic orientation reveals itself. Exploring a corpus for what it says about a culture is in line with the increasing interest in the ways in which language structure and use reflect cultural traits.10 In the way in which we have proceeded in this study, we have explored not just corpus-based connections of just any sort between body-part concepts; rather it is the connectivity between body-part terms within specific constructional frames that has been explored and reported on, particularly from the point of view of whether the collocating body-part terms refer to a self only or self and other. It has been, therefore, an exploration into particular linguistic mediation of such interconnectivity. It is neither simply a glimpse into the culture behind the corpus nor simply our biology, but a study of language expressing the interconnectivity of body-part terms. It is reasonable to inquire into the kind of “reality” represented by the collocate pairings in (6). Some recent publications have turned attention to the question of the psychological reality of collocates. Durrant and Doherty (2010) 10

Cf., for example, publications on the relationship between language structure and culture such as Wierzbicka (1996) and Enfield (2002). For corpus-based studies of the relationship between language and culture, see, for example, Leech and Fallon (1992) and Stubbs (1996).

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summarize much of the experimental literature on this issue, as well as offering their own set of experiments which establish a (qualified kind of) positive answer, suggesting that indeed some kinds of collocate pairs give rise to psycholinguistic effects expected of words which ‘prime’ other words. Durrant and Doherty’s findings apply most convincingly to collocate pairs that are frequent and where there is a high association strength score between the two words, conditions which do no always apply in the present study. While collocate pairs like those listed in (6) have a certain naturalness about them, I am not in a position to assign any specific kind of psychological reality to them. And, regardless of what experimental evidence says about the psychological reality of collocates, the pairings in (6) do not represent the kinds of relationships which routinely (or ever?) enter into semantic change of body-part terms, as attested diachronically or through polysemy (to the best of my knowledge). Nor is change of meaning of a body-part term to that of its collocate anywhere to be found in Stern’s comprehensive discussion of semantic change (Stern 1931).11 The investigation into collocates of body-part terms may reveal many intriguing and under-researched relationships between the terms, but the results do nothing to alter our view about the semantic shifts involved with such terms, as observed in polysemy, for example. Our investigation, however, points to a whole world of relationships which are part and parcel of the meaning and use of body-part terms, entirely overlooked in the literature on the semantic shifts of body-part terms.

11

One candidate for semantic change to that of a collocate in English might be kith. According to the OED Online (2011), the original meanings of kith were: (1) knowledge, acquaintance with something; knowledge communicated, information; (2) knowledge how to behave; rules of etiquette; (3) the country or place that is known or familiar; one’s native land, home; hence gen. country, region, quarter; (4) the persons who are known or familiar, taken collectively; one’s friends, fellow-countrymen, or neighbors; acquaintance. The phrase kith and kin referred originally (earliest date is 1357 in the OED) to one’s ‘country and relatives’ (sense (3) of kith). Later the phrase came to refer to one’s ‘friends and relatives’ (sense (4) of kith). Now, the phrase is taken to refer, pleonastically, to ‘relatives’. One could say, then, that the meaning of kith has changed to the meaning of its collocate kin, within the phrase kith and kin. Or, at least, one could say that the meaning of kith has been influenced by its collocate kin. The presence of the conjunction and is undoubtedly relevant here, since it helps to create the equivocation, i.e., uncertainty about what a form actually designates, which Stern (1931: 355–358) considers so important. There is no such equivocation in the case of putting a finger to the lips or putting hands on the hip.

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5 Conclusions I welcome an interest in the many ways in which language, considered both in terms of language structure and language use, can be viewed as a reflection of our own biology or own culture. This is what may be called an experientialist approach to the study of language and recalls Lakoff’s view about what an experientialist approach entails: an attempt “to characterize meaning in terms of the nature and experience of the organisms doing the thinking” (Lakoff 1987: 266). And, consequently, my own investigation into collocates has led me to explore how the use of body-part terms reflects the roles of the self vs. other in bodily actions. The results are not ones that could be predicted: one could not know in advance that in a full 201/201 cases, hand collocates with the other’s arm (never with the self’s arm) in on constructions. Nor could one know in advance the exact extent to which one encounters references to male arms around a female waist, or female arms around a male neck. One might have some intuitions about such scenarios, but one cannot know the actual usage of such expressions until the corpus research has been carried out. My study has shown, too, the desirability of exploring both lemmas and word forms—in some cases, only the singular, or only the plural, of the body-part term is relevant to the preferred collocate behavior, as in hands on . . . knees which always involves the other’s knees, but only when both nouns are in the plural. The corpus-based approach adopted here leads to an expanded view of the semantic space relevant to understanding how body-part terms interrelate. For one thing, the corpus-based approach reveals the many and varied ways in which social and cultural routines motivate body-part collocations. For example, the common routine of folding arms across the chest gives rise to chest as a frequent collocate of the plural form arms. In this case, the underlying routine is associated with an individual person, a self. In addition, there are collocates that point to the necessity of recognizing interactions between the self and others. For example, neck collocates with arm of the other, as seen in examples such as Elaine had placed her arm around his neck. Such an approach leads to a view of the interconnectedness of body-part words/concepts which goes well beyond the usual connections established only through considerations of polysemy and diachronic change. The use of body-part terms must be understood against the backdrop of multiple bodies, not just one body. Of course, this is most obvious in the case of genital organs, but our investigation has revealed a similarly gendered use of body-part terms not normally so construed, e.g. arm, knee, neck, waist. Ultimately, the image of a body and its internal parts may be a more dominant image than the miscellaneous images of multiple bodies and how they interact. Nevertheless, there is much that a

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corpus (no pun intended) can teach us about the interconnectivity of bodyparts both within the self and between the self and others. Acknowledgements I am grateful to Sally Rice for improvements to the original draft of this chapter. References Croft, William. 2001. Radical Construction Grammar: Syntactic Theory in Typological Perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Davies, Mark and Dee Gardner. 2010. Frequency Dictionary of Contemporary American English: Word Sketches, Collocates, and Thematic Lists. London and New York: Routledge. ———. 2011. Creating and using the Frequency Dictionary of Contemporary American English: Word Sketches, Collocates, and Thematic Lists. In John Newman, Harald Baayen, and Sally Rice (eds.), Corpus-based Studies in Language Use, Language Learning, and Language Documentation, pp. 283–297. Amsterdam: Rodopi Press. Durrant, Philip and Alice Doherty. 2010. Are high-frequency collocations psychologically real? Investigating the thesis of collocational priming. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory 6.2: 125–155. Enfield, N. (ed.). 2002. Ethnosyntax: Explorations in Culture and Grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Firth, J. R. 1957. Papers in Linguistics 1934–1951. London: Oxford University Press. Goschler, Juliana. 2005. Embodiment and body metaphors. metaphorik.de (online journal) 09/2005. http://www.metaphorik.de/09/. Heine, Bernd. 1997. Cognitive Foundations of Grammar. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Kilgarriff, Adam, Pavel Rychlý, Pavel Smrz, and David Tugwell. 2004. The Sketch Engine. Proceedings of EURALEX 2004, Lorient, France, pp. 105–116. url: http://www .sketchengine.co.uk. Koch, Peter. 2008. Cognitive onomasiology and lexical change. In Martine Vanhove (ed.), From Polysemy to Semantic Change: Towards a Typology of Lexical Semantic Associations, pp. 107–137. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Koptjevskaja-Tamm, M. 2008. Approaching lexical typology. In M. Vanhove (ed.), From Polysemy to Semantic Change: Towards a Typology of Lexical Semantic Associations, pp. 3–52. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins.

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Lakoff, George. 1987. Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Leech, G. and R. Fallon. 1992. Computer corpora—What do they tell us about culture? ICAME Journal 16: 29–50.  OED Online. 2011. The Oxford English Dictionary Online. Oxford University Press, accessed through the University of Alberta. Rychlý, Pavel. 2008. A lexicographer-friendly association score. In Petr Sojka and Aleš Horák (eds.), Proceedings of Recent Advances in Slavonic Natural Language Processing, RASLAN 2008, pp. 6–9. Masaryk University, Brno. url: http://www.fi .muni.cz/usr/sojka/download/raslan2008/raslan08.pdf. Stefanowitsch, Anatol and Stefan Th. Gries. 2003. Collostructions: Investigating the interaction between words and constructions. International Journal of Corpus Linguistics 8.2: 209–243. Stern, Gustaf. 1931. Meaning and Change of Meaning: With Special Reference to the English Language. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press. Stubbs, Michael. 1996. Text and corpus analysis: Computer assisted studies of language and culture. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. Tummers, Jose, Kris Heylen, and Dirk Geeraerts. 2005. Usage-based approaches in Cognitive Linguistics: A technical state of the art. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory 1.2: 225–261. Wiechmann, Daniel. 2008. On the computation of collostruction strength: Testing measures of association as expressions of lexical bias. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory, 4.2: 253–290. Wierzbicka, Anna. 1996. Semantics, Culture, and Cognition. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Wilkins, David. 1996. Natural tendencies of semantic change and the search for cognates. In Mark Durie and Malcom Ross (eds.), The Comparative Method Reviewed, pp. 264–304. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Notions of SELF in Hausa Nina Pawlak Abstract The paper deals with the special ways of expressing the notion of the SELF in Hausa that function as linguistic patterns of person. The language data demonstrates how personal identity is constructed as an idea and what consciousness this idea is founded on. Lexical, morphological and syntactic data, as its structural representation, refer to self-identity, self-perception, and self-categorization. Special attention is placed on body part terms that are widely attested in Hausa in the function of lexical exponents for person. The concept of person is analyzed on the basis of some basic equivalents for the SELF (kai, jiki, rai, hankali) which determine the understanding of the concept in some particular contexts. As a result, the discourse properties of certain systemic devices allow for indicating some cultural implications of their content.

Introduction The notion of the SELF has its roots in one’s identity. As a form of self-knowledge, it is what one knows about oneself, and is referred to in the first person. The notion, however, has a broader meaning. It is in fact a relational concept, the idea of which includes some ‘external’ factors, such as views on the surrounding world and references to the views and perceptions of others. There are different attitudes towards studying ‘selfhood’; the concept is important within various philosophic debates (see Perry 1990, Perry 1998), but it is also present in other works dealing with the nature of self-consciousness, the nature of bodily awareness (Bermudez et al. 1998) or human emotions (Athanasiadou, Tabakowska 1998). In linguistic analyses, the main question pertains to how the notion is conceptualized within language and to what extent the human body is a structural template for describing the concept. Linguistic representation of the notion of the SELF includes lexical terms, but also direct statements concerning self-perception and some metaphoric patterns of modelling a person. An analysis of linguistic devices allows for the formulation of statements on the notion itself and on whether there are some culturally oriented features in its understanding. The Hausa language provides a variety of forms for studying the structural representation of the notion of the SELF. As in many other languages, body

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part terms and other lexical, grammatical and figurative expressions are used to express the meaning. However, systemic devices are not the only sources of conceptualization of the notion. Linguistic communication, which takes place under specific conditions and includes speaker-hearer interaction (Heine 1997: 15), also has an effect on how self-consciousness and self-perception is manifested. This paper aims to demonstrate that discourse features may influence the way the conceptualization patterns of the SELF function. The methodological background for the present analysis is based on the contextual meanings of lexical items with special focus on new meanings developed through semantic derivation. The analysis has been conducted with the assumption that what is expressed in language has its cultural dimension. The interpretation of data refers specifically to the theory (concept) of ‘language view (picture) of the world’/‘Sprachliches Weltbild’ (Underhill 2011, Bartmiński 2006) that explores the relationship between language, culture, and conceptualization. The sources for linguistic studies were found in literary texts based on oral tradition (mainly Magana Jari Ce by Abubakar Imam) as well as in newly created texts distributed over the internet that represent modern communication in Hausa.

Lexical Equivalents for ‘Person’, ‘Individual’, ‘Human Being’

The lexical representation of ‘person’ is primarily attributed to the word mutum (mùtûm)1/mutumin (mùtumìn) in its genitive form, which is homogenous with the equivalent for ‘man’, ‘male’. When we speak about a person in Hausa we must define more precisely whether we mean ‘man’ or ‘woman’ (màcè in the latter case). The derivational feminine form of mutum—mutuniya (mùtūnìyā) also exists. Both these forms may be used in some nominal compounds. Therefore: (1) mutumin kirki ‘good fellow’; mutumin banza ‘good-for-nothing fellow’ (2) mutuniyar kirki ‘decent sort of woman or girl’; mutuniyar banza ‘useless girl or woman’ 1 The marking of tone and vowel length is provided only for lexical items presented as terms. Therefore, ` stands for a low tone, ˆ for a rising tone (a high tone remains unmarked), whereas a dash ¯ is to indicate a long vowel. In contextual use, the words remain unmarked which is a standard Hausa orthographic rule.

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However, in some phrases the word mutum may have a feminine identification, when the other constituents of the sentence indicate the gender: (3) ya isa mutum ‘he became an adult’ ta isa mutum ‘she became an adult’ (A)2

The word mutum functions as a detached form of self-reference in the sense attributed to the generic one in English (e.g. one should not lie). As a pronoun, one bears a particular semantic connection to the first person (Moltmann 2010: 442), the understanding of which is that the speaker projects him- or herself onto others. Contrary to self-reference with pronouns, it does not stand for the speaker’s actual person, but rather for a range of individuals that the speaker identifies with (Moltman 2010: 440). With this reference, the word mutum is often used in proverbs, e.g.: (4) Mutum da gishirinsa, in ya ga dama ya dafa ƙaho. ‘one does not need property after one (lit. a person) dies’ (5) Mutum a gidansa Sarki ne ‘everyone (lit. a person) is a master in [his own] home’ (6) Mutanen duniya su kai mutum inda Allah bai kai shi ba ‘only people can do for someone (lit. for a person) what Allah would not do’

As a strategy to express the notion of the SELF with reference to others, mutum is widely used in religious texts. (7) Shin mutum na da zabi? Yaya iyakar zabinsa yake? ‘Does everyone (lit. a person) have a choice?’ What are the limits of this choice? (8) Tana zama sunna a kan mutum ga kansa da iyayensa ‘it (e.g. custom) becomes sunna for a person himself and for his parents’ (9) mutum mai zunubi ne ‘everyone (lit. a person) is a sinner’

2 Examples identified only in dictionaries but not confirmed in other sources are given a reference marker, (A) or (B), i.e. Abraham 1962 or Bargery 1934 respectively.

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The concept of an individual has another lexical representation, namely ɗan Adam (lit. son of Adam) with its feminine counterpart ’yar Adam (lit. daughter of Adam), alternatively bìl Adama/Bil’adama ‘son of Adam’.3 As stated above, nominal equivalents attributed to the generic one in Hausa express self-reference indirectly, through identification with others. Viewed comparatively, it has the same function as the unspecified pronoun in other languages.4 As for Hausa, the use of the word mutum in this function manifests identification with mankind, people in general.

The First-Person Pronoun

The systemic device for ‘I’ in Hausa (the first-person pronoun) takes the form ni in syntactically independent contexts. In an equational sentence, the pronoun marks the subjective status of the speaker,5 other constituents fill the slot of a predicate, e.g. ni malami ne ‘I am a teacher’. However, in Hausa, unlike in English, ‘I am’ statements with a copula ‘be’ predicate are gender sensitive, therefore ‘that’s me’ is ni ne (masc.) and ni ce (fem.) to mark whether the speaker is male or female respectively. The syntactic rules, which are established within a subject-controlling system (cf. Newman 2000: 163), indicate the gender of the first-person pronoun through other additional constituents: (10) Ni Bahaushe (m.) ne ‘I am a Hausa man’ (11) Ni Bahaushiya (f.) ce ‘I am a Hausa woman’

The use of a pronoun in first-person statements is a direct reference to the speaker (writer). Self-reference, however, is not necessarily connected with the use of the pronoun in its independent form (ni ‘I’). Subject pronouns that function as conjugation morphemes (in the form of weak subject pronouns, Newman 2000: 485) also carry the notion of ‘person’, therefore na ce ‘I said’ is a verbal complex consisting of the morphemes [1Sg/PERF say], which clearly 3 This term was used in the Hausa translation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights for the United Nations (Dokokin Duniya kan Hakkin Bil’adama na Majalisar Dunkin Duniya). 4 The strategy for generic one may be based on the pronoun you, as, for example, in American English (Moltmann 2010: 443). 5 Independent pronouns in Hausa are also used in prepositional phrases, e.g. da ni ‘with me’, where their status is different.

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indicate that the statement applies to the speaker. Such statements, however, also imply that the role of the speaker is slightly reduced. In order to stress the reference of the statement to the speaker him- or herself, the pronoun ni may be used. Syntactically, it is an additional focus slot (usually with a copula), i.e. Ni (ne) na ce ‘I am the one who said’, ni ban ji ba ‘(as for me) I don’t understand’. It is therefore not its syntactic but its pragmatic function that determines the use of the independent form of the pronoun. As stated above, the first-person pronoun indicates that the subject is the speaker, the maker of the statement. However, the communication properties of the statements with first-person pronouns vary, depending on the context and type of discourse. There are some conventionalized patterns that avoid using the first-person pronoun overtly as a result of accepted norms of politeness. For example, the pragmatic function of a ganina ‘according to my view’ or kamar yadda na ke tsammani ‘according to what I think’ is different from ni na ke tsammani ‘(as for me) I think’, though their communicative function is the same. The latter phrase is expected to be used by someone who has a higher social position,6 whereas the earlier ones do not imply such a context. When expressing wishes or commands, additional phrases that introduce the verb in subjunctive are used, e.g. bari in je ‘let me go’,7 in order to reduce the rank of the speaker in relation to the hearer. The avoidance of indicating a referential subject is more specifically manifested in a separate verb paradigm termed as impersonal, as in an kawo ruwa ‘one/they brought water’ (Pawlak 2009). However, it is not applied to the first person (Newman 2000: 272), thus this fact confirms the special status of self-reference in communication.

Body-Part Terms as Key-Words of Personal Identity

The concept of ‘person’ may also be rendered metaphorically. The main aspects of personal identity (the mind, the face, the heart, the soul, the character) find their lexical representation in other terms, the basic meaning of which is different. In Hausa, as in many other world languages, most of these are body part terms. The question arises as to how these ways of representing the body are connected with self-perception and which forms of social interaction are thus encoded?

6 These rules are violated in conversations between people of equal status, especially among youth (Chamo 2012). 7 The subjunctive is a polite form when used with other pronouns, e.g. bari mu je ‘let’s go’.

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In the analysis of Hausa language sources, the bridge between body and self was found in the following terms that function as equivalents of ‘person’: kai ‘head’, ido ‘eye’, fuska ‘face’, zuciya ‘heart’, hannu ‘hand’ and jiki ‘body’. They may be used to indicate the relevant body part, as in kaina yana ciwo ‘I have a headache’ (lit. my head is in pain), ido ya yi baƙo ‘the eye has got something in it’, but often they express the state/activities of a person, i.e.: (12) Ya jawo wa kansa ja’iba ‘he brought misfortune on himself’ (lit. on his head) (13) Mu gano wa idanmu! ‘let us see for ourselves!’ (lit. for our eyes) (14) Allay a haɗa fuskokinmu ‘may we meet again soon! (lit. join our faces) (15) Ya ce da zuciya tasa . . . ‘he said to himself that . . .’ (lit. to his heart) (16) Al’amarinsu na hannuna ‘I am in charge of their affairs’ (lit. their affairs are in my hand) (17) Sun haɗa jiki ‘they have collected in a group’ (lit. they joined bodies)

In the function of personal identity they are not interchangeable, as their semantic content is different (see Almajir 2013). They usually occur in fixed collocation phrases or express the person’s activities metonymically, as in zuciyata ta ɓaci ‘I am feeling sad’ (lit. my heart was spoiled). The examples indicate that body part terms locate self-reference in an actual state or activity, and the person is identified through the involvement of a particular body part in it. The strategy is commonly explored in various languages, but it is interesting to note that in Hausa the location of some common activities is different from what is expected or known from European languages, e.g. riƙe a zuci ‘keep in mind’ (lit. keep in heart), direct (‘face to face’) confrontation is perceived as ido da ido (lit. eye to eye, therefore ido-huɗu, lit. four eyes ‘face to face confrontation’), whereas emotions are coded through references to the stomach rather than to the heart (ya yi farin ciki ‘he is/was pleased with it’ (lit. he made a white stomach). The differences in coding one notion through body part terms may influence the recognition of the content, especially when it is translated into foreign languages. The following phrase in English containing ‘hands’ needs to be translated into Hausa with the use of kai ‘head’. A direct translation using the word hannu ‘hand’ would not be adequate in this case, according to the intuitive knowledge of the language of a native speaker (Yakasai 2001: 22):

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(18) English: The public has been warned not to take law into their hands Hausa: An gargaɗi jama’a kada su yi wa kansu hukunci

For identifying terms of self-reference, two aspects are of importance, namely the use of body part terms as direct equivalents of ‘person’ (with their creative use in the function of subject or object) as well as constituting a reflexive reference to the subject. In Hausa, two body part terms are to be distinguished in this connection, namely kai ‘head’ and jiki ‘body’. They express the notion of the SELF in many stylistic variants. Moreover, both become grammaticalized to render self-pronouns.

Kai [kâi] ‘head’

The noun kai [kâi] (pl. kawuna [kāwunā� ]) meaning ‘individual’, ‘member’ is used as the subject of the sentence, e.g.: (19) In kawunan mutum uku suka yi magana aka iske ta yadda ta ke, wannan ya cika mutum. ‘when three (heads of the) people discussed, the essence was searched for, (as) this is important for a human’ (20) Ga lissafin kawunan iyalin Isra’ilawa, da shugabannin dangi, da jama’a ‘here are members (lit. heads) of the Israeli family, prominent relatives and the public’

With this meaning, it may also be used as an object in the function of either a pronoun or a noun, e.g.: (21)

Don Allah, wannan kare, ka dubi zumunci, ka ji kaina, ka sake ni (Magana Jari Ce) ‘for goodness sake, dog, be friendly, listen to me (lit. my head), release me’

(22) Sannan kuma ga rikicin tazarce na shugaba Obasanjo, wanda ya raba kawunan ’ya’yan jam’iyyar ‘at that time there were secret plans against Obasanjo who divided (individual) members of the party’

As a representation of a person (an individual), kai forms a set of ‘self’ pronouns. Therefore, the expressions ‘myself’, ‘yourself’, ‘himself’, etc. are formed

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in Hausa as kaina, kanka, kansa ‘my head’, ‘your head’, ‘his head’. They are called reflexives when they reflect back to the subject. In these structures, kai as an object is identical with the subject, e.g. (Bargery 1934): (23) wannan Bahaushe ya danganta kansa ga Filani ‘this Hausa has affiliated himself to the Fulani’ (lit. this Hausa has associated his head with Fulani) (24) ya jawo wa kansa ja’iba ‘he brought misfortune on himself’ (lit. on his head) (25) sun cuci kansu ‘they cheated themselves’ (26) yana son ɓoye kansa, amma ya kasa ‘he wanted to hide himself, but he couldn’t’

The reflexives may also function as intensive pronouns when used to intensify (emphasize) the subject. They usually occur with the preposition da [dà] ‘with’, e.g. (Schuh 1976: 263): (27) Ni da kaina ba na sonta (lit. I and my head do not like her) ‘I don’t like her myself’ (28) Su da kansu suka yi aiki (lit. they and their heads did the work) ‘they themselves did the work’

Emphatic reflexives are also formed with an independent pronoun followed by a reflexive pronoun in apposition. This phrase may also be combined with a noun, e.g. (Newman 2000: 62): (29) Ita kanta tauraruwa ce (lit. she her head is a star) ‘she herself is a star’ (30) Ya sa Kande ita kanta ta koma gida (lit. he caused Kande she her head to return home) ‘he caused Kande herself to return home’

Phrases with kai may also be formulated with the word functioning as being complementary to the verb. They conceptualize unaided action, an independent activity of a person, e.g. (Abraham 1962):

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(31) ya zo da kansa ‘he came himself ’ (lit. he came with his head) cf. shi kaɗai ‘he alone, by himself’ (32) Sun yi aiki da kansu (lit. they did the work with their heads) ‘they did the work themselves’

In the emphatic function, kai ‘head’ is used to support self-identification and to stress the concept of a person as a doer, a subject of an action or an agent. Other semantic derivations of kai show that it carries the notion of a person’s character, individuality, responsibility, the essence of his activity, e.g. (Schuh 1976: 263): (33) Yi ta kanka ‘be on your guard’ (lit. do via your head) The use of kai in phrasal expressions is connected with evaluation (‘the best’) and rivalry (‘get ahead’), e.g.: (34) ya sha (=ya ci) kansu = ya sha musu kai ‘he managed to get ahead of them’

The word kai functions in many figurative expressions that have a metonymic relation to self-perception, which confirms the involvement of the word ‘head’ in the conceptualization of the notion. (35) Ya ƙuƙunce kansa ‘he brought destruction on himself’ (lit. he has one hand tied round his head) (B) (36) Gashin kansa yake ci ‘he is working for himself (lit. he is eating the hair on/from his own head)’, i.e. he is his own master. (B) (37) yana cira kai ‘he is thinking a lot of himself; he is treating people with contempt’ (lit. He is raising his head) (B) (38) ya dafa kansa ‘he went off at full speed’ (lit. he pressed on his head) (A)



Jiki [jìkī] ‘body’

The noun jiki in its concrete meaning denotes ‘body’ and is used when referring to the physical attributes of a person. The concrete meaning ‘body’ is a

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semantic component of many expressions, as for example wasannin motsa jiki ‘physical training, gymnastics’ (lit. games exercising the body) or proverbs, like jiki magayi ‘the body is the informer’ (i.e. the body tells you how you are feeling), but this term may also conceptualize other notions. Its usage as a form of reference to a person is clearly manifested in many contexts, e.g.: (39) jikinsa yana rawa, ya yi ihu ‘his body/he was dancing, he was yelling’ (40) jikinsa ya faɗi kwatsam ‘his body fell into decline’, ‘he lost strength’ (41) K’asahen duniya na jinye jiki ga Rwanda ‘The International Rescue (Committee) for Rwanda’ ( jinye jiki ‘tending sick body’)

When used in the object position, jiki regularly does not attach a personal pronoun: (42) Sun haɗa jiki ‘they have collected in a group’ (lit. they joined bodies)

However, it optionally includes a bound genitive pronoun to mark its reflexive function, e.g.: (43) Ya wanke jiki(nsa) ‘he washed (his) body’8

The noun jiki also has another manifestation in linguistic patterns for encoding self-reference. The word juna ‘other’, which is a lexical device for reciprocals, can be etymologically traced back to jiki ‘body’ + a suffix –na (Newman 2000: 529). It has distinct forms in the first, second, and third person, diversified by the attached personal pronouns, i.e. junanmu ‘each other (we)’, junanku ‘each other (you, pl.)’, junansu ‘each other (they)’ and juna used as impersonal, e.g. (Newman 2000: 530): (44) Ku taimaki junanku ‘you (pl.) should help one another’ (45) Kowa ya san juna nan ‘everyone knows each other here’

8 Ya wanke ido/kai ‘he washed face/head’ in particular contexts.

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In coding self-reference, jiki stands for the actual person mentioned in the statement or people in general. It identifies the subject, object, or agent of an action, similarly to the body part terms, but does not give any of this person’s particular characteristics.

Other Notions for Person

Among the lexical equivalents of ‘person’ in Hausa, two words, namely rai and hankali, are of great significance in marking the notion.

Rai [râi] ‘life’

The basic meaning of rai is ‘life’ (as in masu rai ‘living’, ‘alive’). When used as a subject or an object, the word refers to a person, e.g.: (46) raina ya yi fari ‘I feel happy’ (lit. my life became white) (47) ransa ya yi farin ciki ‘he was happy’ (lit. his life was happy/had a white stomach) (48) raina a ɓace ya ke ‘I am feeling depressed’ (lit. my life is spoiled) (49) Alla ya ɗauki ransu ‘they died’ (i.e. Allah took them, lit. Allah took their lives) (A)

Rai functions in many phrases that are conventionalized within communication, such as ranka ya daɗe ‘long life to you!’ (lit. be your life prolonged) addressed to someone superior, or sai na ce cikin raina ‘then I said to myself’ (lit. I said in my life) and express self-reference. The noun rai is used in many phrases with religious connotations, such as in the case of hasken rai ‘the light of life/illuminated life’, tarbiyyar rai ‘(religious) code of behaviour’, tsarkake rai ‘cleansing’. It also carries the meaning ‘soul’, e.g. ransa yana Aljanna ‘his soul has gone to heaven’ (Ma Newman 1990). In terms of self-identity, the noun refers to the person as its direct representation. Its function is therefore similar to that of personal pronouns, e.g.: (50) ransa yana sansa ‘he wants it’ (lit. his life wants it) (A)

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(51) ya tsattsaga yadda ransa ya ga dama ‘he rammed down is if he was dead’ (lit. his life saw the right side)9 (52) ya koma rai ga Alla ‘he became helpless’ (lit. he returned himself/life back to Allah) (A)

The notion of the SELF which is transmitted through the word rai is not restricted to self-identification. It also carries some other meanings that are related to the essence of human existence. In particular contexts, it refers to a person’s character. The phrase baƙin rai (in the Katsina dialect) ‘evil character’ (lit. black life) is used to confirm the semantic extension of the meaning ‘life, being alive’ to the meaning ‘life content’ that focuses on non-physical aspects of human existence.

Hankali [hankàlī] ‘mind’, ‘intelligence’

Another word for expressing self-reference, i.e. hankali, has several contextual meanings, such as ‘mind’, ‘intelligence’, ‘good sense’, ‘attention’. When used in the function of a subject, it substitutes a person. Hankali is usually accompanied by a possessive pronoun, either the first-person pronoun or other person pronouns e.g.: (53) hankalina ya rabu biyu ‘I am distracted’ (lit. my mind is divided into two) (A) (54) hankalinsa ya tashi ‘he is disturbed in his mind; he is upset’ (lit. his sense stood up) (R) (55) hankalinsa a makaranta yake ‘he (his whole mind) is concentrated on learning’ (R) (56) hankalinsa da wurim mata yake ‘he thinks of nothing but women’ (A) (lit. his mind is at women’s place)

In these statements, hankali indicates a person in the aspect of the personality that refers to the mind. Contrary to rai ‘life’, the term focuses on the actual person and refers to one’s current state. 9 The phrase refers to the way the body is laid down (i.e. put on the right side) after death.

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The word may also be placed in the object position, usually with the verb ja(wo) ‘draw’, i.e. jawo hankali ‘draw attention’, e.g.: (57) idan akwai wani batu da zai ja hankali, ya kuma kawo dogon turanci ‘when a topic that draws attention appears, it brings senseless talk’

Ja(wo) hankali is a phrasal verb, in which the notion hankali does not refer to the subject of the sentence but to the object (which is different), as in ya jawo hankalina ‘he drew my attention’). With the use of this verb, self-reference is marked by adding a personal pronoun (hankalina ‘my attention’), but at the same time it is connected with the action of another agent. When the subject of the clause is not expressed, the impersonal form is used, e.g.: (58) ya nuna fushinsa ne ga wani talla da aka jawo hankalinsa a rediyo ‘he was angry because of a radio advertisement which drew his attention’, lit. [ . . .] ‘to which (someone) drew his attention’ (59) wato ta fuskacin jawo hankalinsa ya ga kyawun Musulunci ‘by (someone) drawing his attention (to it), he saw the beauty of Islam’

Other Conceptual Metaphors Hausa is recognized as being a highly metaphoric language. The above expressions containing kai, jiki, rai, and hankali are figures of speech that give human traits to non-living objects. In terms of cognitive concepts, they represent conceptual metaphors in their ontological type (Lakoff, Johnson 1980) in which a person is represented by non-personal object or idea. However, metaphors for self-reference can be found not only in semantic extensions of lexical meanings, but also in some structural patterns. Self-identity may be coded as a relation between verb arguments among which the speaker is identified as an experiencer (Patient) rather than a doer (Agent). The structures are preferably used while speaking about a person’s emotions, feelings, desires, e.g. (Pawlak 2009): (60) sanyi ya harbe ni ‘I am cold, I’ve got a chill’ (lit. a chill has shot me down) (61) haushi ya kama ni ‘I am angry’ (lit. annoyance has caught me) (62) daɗi ya kama shi ‘he is happy’ (lit. pleasantness has caught him)

The state and feelings of the person identified as the recipient may also be conceptualized through a description of the situation as having been created

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by someone. A specific metaphor used, which refers to an actual person’s state, comes in the form of a description of what has been caused by Allah, e.g. (Magana Jari Ce): (63) yana da haƙurin da Allah ya zuba masa ‘he is patient’ (lit. he has patience poured on him by Allah) (64) ya yi yawo har Allah ya gajishe shi ‘he was walking until he became tired’ (lit. he was walking until Allah made him tired’)

The example (64) shows that the self-perception is manifested differently in the two parts of the sentence: person’s activity and his involvement in an action is marked by the use of personal pronoun as subject of the sentence, whereas person’s physical state (tiredness in this case) is identified as passive experience as it is caused by external factors.

The Relational Concept of ‘Person’ in Systemic Inventory

Linguistic representation for notions of the SELF in Hausa is based on a variety of lexical equivalents for ‘person’ and different structural patterns. The exponents are open for further sub-categorization, depending on how selfknowledge is manifested. The presented equivalents for selfhood mark selfperception through a system of oppositions that allow for distinguishing the actual person from the general concept of ‘person’, the person indicated as the speaker from the person identified by some special characteristics, and finally the person who is an agent (doer) from the person who is a recipient. All these aspects find their manifestation in specific contexts, which determine the use of particular expressions. Lexical and stylistic variants that express self-reference in Hausa create space for studying personality and its cultural dimension. In Hausa, the richness of structural devices reduces the role of personal pronouns as prime devices in marking the concept. From this perspective, the concept ‘I’ may be identified through its main lexical representatives in the following way: ‘I’ = person identified as the living being ( jikina ‘my body’) ‘I’ = an individual (kaina ‘my head’) ‘I’ = human being, part of the world’s existence (raina ‘my life’) ‘I’ = experiencer of the surrounding world (hankali ‘mind’, other metaphors)

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Within the representation of lexical equivalents to encode self-reference, two body part terms, namely jiki ‘body’ and kai ‘head’, as well as the noun rai ‘life’ became recognized as the main nominal sources for reflexive markers in African languages (Heine 2008). Their reference to ‘person’ has been confirmed within conceptualization patterns which have a wide distribution. The use of ‘head’ and ‘body’ for reflexives and reciprocals is widespread throughout the Chadic language family (Newman 2000: 529). The two nouns function as reflexive markers also in the non-related languages of the Western Sahel zone (Fulani, Songhay). As for rai, its reference to ‘person’ is correlated with marking reflexivity in the languages of the Eastern Sahel zone where the stem for ‘soul’ or ‘life’ is used. Following this hypothesis (Heine 2008), the concept of Arabic nefs or rūħ and the spread of Islam laid the ground for the distribution of this pattern. Different patterns for conceptualization of SELF-notions in Hausa are primarily seen as being structural features of this language. As has been shown, the semantics of the exponents vary, as a result of the contexts in which they are used. The four dimensions in which the notion was set represent different values attributed to a ‘person’. These are differentiated from the ontological perspective and represent various aspects of one’s personality. They may be regarded as stylistic variants, which are also connected with coding self-reference. The question arises whether particular strategies to encode ‘person’ are pragmatically motivated and may also have cultural reference.

SELF-Notions in Discourse Strategies

The social context of the Hausa language is broad. The language is used in oral and written communication as an ethnic language; it is also a language of wider communication in the inter-ethnic context. Studies on the discourse properties of this language are still at an initial stage, thus there is much to be done in the scope of examining the types of texts and main characteristics of Hausa narrative. Written texts are significantly diverse due to their various adherence to the Standard norm, especially in terms of orthographic rules,10 but in the present analysis the content is primarily seen as the fundaments for determining the structural properties of the language. The analysis was based 10

As a written language, Hausa functions in two writing systems, i.e. boko (based on the Roman alphabet, and ajami (employing Arabic script). The orthography in boko was established in the mid 1930s as a standard norm which is used in press, literature, school books.

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on three kinds of texts, namely a literary text that follows a stylistic convention of oral tradition (Magana Jari Ce), contemporary religious texts (including religious disputes), as well as press articles and personal blogs of the Hausa intellectual elite in which discussions on various topics were conducted. Taking into account such a differentiation, some preferred strategies of manifesting the SELF-notion have been distinguished. The literary text based on oral tradition is the main source of metaphoric expressions in which self-reference is rendered indirectly. The prime device, jiki ‘body’, is used both in its grammatical function of marking reciprocals/ reflexives and in figurative statements referring to the person which explores the metaphor of his states and activities (examples from Magana Jari Ce): (65) Mu dai mun saki jiki da duniya yanzu, ba mu shirin kome ‘we lead carefree life (lit. we have separated (our) bodies from the world), we have no plans’ (66) takamar da na ke yi [. . . ]saboda kyaun jikina kadai na ke yi ba ‘I am proud [. . .] because I am beautiful (lit. due to the beauty of my body)

However, in everyday communication, jikinsa yana rawa ‘he/his body is dancing’ in an unmarked statement would rather be replaced by pronominal coding, i.e. (shi) yana rawa ‘he is dancing’. The word kai ‘head’, which places stress on individuality (independence in further derivation), is a widely attested means for self-reference in modern texts (press articles on political issues, individual blogs, for example), which discuss questions of mulkin kai ‘independence’ (lit. power of head), taimakon kai da kai ‘self-help’ (lit. help of head and head), san kai ‘egoism’ (lit. love for head). If we refer to the structural varieties of reflexives based on the word kai (cf. Newman 2000: 522ff), it is possible to observe that the phrases encoding self-reference are creatively adapted to current communication purposes, e.g. (67) za a bada dama ga jihohi su kafa ’yan sandan kansu ‘states will get the opportunity to create a police service of their own’

It is interesting to note that the notion ‘partnership’ in its political connotation makes use of gwiwa ‘knee’ rather than ‘head’ (the phrases haɗa kai, lit. ‘to join head’ and haɗa gwiwa lit. ‘to join knee’ are synonyms in expressing the meaning ‘cooperate, unite’). The use of the word gwiwa seems to be pragmatically motivated as the notions of individuality and independence are reduced in this context, e.g:

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(68) kasar Benin da [ . . . ] AU sun haɗa gwiwa sosai tare da ƙasar Sin ‘Benin and [other countries of] African Union have established a partnership with China’

Rai ‘life, soul’ is used phraseologically in texts which refer to person’s feelings and experience. It can be encountered in petrified expressions such as ya ce a ransa ‘he said to himself’ (lit. he said to his life), more significantly, however, it is a metaphoric base for self-reference in religious texts, e.g.: (69) kullum raina yana tunanin azabaina. Raina kuwa ya karai ‘I am (my life is) always thinking of the great pain I am in. I am (my life is) on the decline’

The strategy of indirect reference is characteristic of figurative speech which is the essence of Hausa rhetorics. In coding self-reference, different exponents may refer to the same meaning differently, as in raina ya ɓaci (lit. my life became spoiled) or zuciyata ta ɓaci (lit. my heart became spoiled) or ina baƙin ciki (lit. I have a black stomach) which express the meaning ‘I am sad, I feel depressed’. When used as paratactic phrases, their expressive function is multiplied, e.g.: (70) Ka duba, ya Ubangiji, ina shan wahala, raina yana cikin damuwa, zuciyata tana makyarkyata saboda tayarwata ‘Look, God, I am suffering trouble, my life is in trouble, my heart is trembling, this is because of my awakening’

As for other structures which refer to coding states, feelings and emotions, some stylistic aspects of their use are also noted. Structures, in which a person is not active in the process of recognizing the surrounding world but passively absorbs impressions from outside, are subject to significant changes in contemporary language. For this reason, some phrases of this kind have been replaced by other structural variants to render meaning. In everyday communication, the statement daɗi ya kama ni ‘I am happy’ (lit. pleasantness has caught me) would rather be replaced by ina jin daɗi ‘I feel happiness’ in which the speaker has a pronominal coding. In Hausa textbooks and manuals used at schools (Junaidu et al. 2007: 9) phrases that express person’s feelings are presented as ‘active’ phrases with pronominal coding. The phrase Bello is sad is therefore rendered as Bello yana cikin fashi (lit. Bello is in bad condition) or Bello ya ɓata rai (lit. Bello has spoiled life) rather than Ran Bello ya ɓaci (lit. Bello’s life became spoiled) as mentioned earlier.

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The choice of structural devices for coding self-reference has non-linguistic motivations and may be culturally determined. The first-person pronoun used as a subject (in its weak or emphatic form) in Hausa is a discursive strategy of coding self-reference which is widely adopted in modern communication. The announcement Ni dai kenan!—‘It’s me!’ opens a personal presentation on a blog in Hausa /www.inamafita.blogspot.com/. The first-person independent pronoun is used to code direct self-reference with a focus on the speaker (writer). Other texts that record interviews with prominent persons have many statements that start with the pronominal ‘I’ (ni in Hausa). This strategy seems to copy the linguistic habits of prominent politicians11 and is a consequence of direct translations from English. In the interview translated from English with Cif Olusegun Obasanjo, the former president of Nigeria, (www.bbc.co.uk/ hausa/news/) the emphatic ni ‘I’ initiates many of the statements, e.g.: (71) Ni ne na ɗorawa kaina wannan aiki . . .  ‘It’s me I permanently engage myself (lit. my head) in this work . . .’

This kind of discourse which ignores the strategies of indirect self-reference significantly influences the development of new standards in Hausa language use. In this context, the statement ina sonka/ina sonki ‘I love you’ has given rise to much controversy in recent decades.12 The statement is an overt manifestation of emotions and contains direct reference to the first person (either a man or woman). This strategy does not remain in agreement with the rules of communication in Hausa (kunya), which reduce the role of a person who is lower in social rank or of a woman during a conversation with a man. The use of this phrase is connected with the adoption of new cultural values which are connected with changing linguistic norms.

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The discourse properties of the use of pronouns ‘I’ and ‘me’ became subject of more detailed interest in the analysis of the presidential campaign in America. Following CNSNews.com, “speaking in Sandusky, Ohio on July 5, President Barack Obama used the first-person pronouns “I” and “me” a combined 117 times in a speech that lasted about 25 minutes and 32 seconds”. The rapid development of the film industry in Hausa has made films with love stories very popular and the statement became easily transmitted into everyday communication, especially among youth (Chamo 2012).

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Concluding Remarks

Linguistic patterns of person are deeply settled in structural variants of expressions. The grammatical and stylistic variants differentiate personal coding, but at the same time some patterns become more transparent in coding selfreference. As it was shown, systemic devices to render the notion of SELF in Hausa are rich and they are referred to various aspects of personality. The analysis of the Hausa language data has revealed the interrelationship between the type of text and the use of some preferred strategies of self-reference which, consequently, determine an influence of communicative strategies on the use of some linguistic patterns for coding the notion of SELF. These remarks are open for further research, linked with the analysis of Hausa discourse and its communicative functions.

Sources of the Language Data

www.aminiya.com www.islamquest.net/ha www.esinislam.com/MediaHausa/ www.4laws.com/laws/hausa/ www.josephkenny.joyeurs.com/HausaBible www.bbc.co.uk/hausa/news www.almizan.net www.harkarmusulunci.org www.hausa.cri.cn www.visionneuse.free.fr www.gumel.com/hausa [Imam, Abubakar. 1939. Magana Jari Ce] References Abraham, R. C. 1962. Dictionary of the Hausa Language. 2nd ed. London: University of London Press (Abbr. A). Almajir, Tijani Shehu. 2013. The Polysemy of Body Part Terms in Hausa within the Frame of Image Schemas, Studies of the Department of African languages and Cultures, vol. 47, 91–109. Athanasiadou, Angeliki and Elżbieta Tabakowska, eds. 1998. Speaking of Emotions: Conceptualisation and Expression. Mouton de Gruyter, Berlin, New York. Bargery, G. P. 1934. A Hausa-English Dictionary and English-Hausa Vocabulary. London: Oxford University Press (Abbr. B).

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Bartmiński Jerzy. 2006. Językowe podstawy obrazu świata, Lublin: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Marii Curie-Skłodowskiej. Bermudez, José Luis and Anthony Marcel, Naomi Eilan. 1998. The body and the self, MIT Press.   Chamo, I. Y. 2012. The Changing Code of Communication in Hausa Films, Ph.D. dissertation, University of Warsaw, LAP Lambert Academic Publishing. Cowan J. Roynane, Schuh Russell G. 1976. Spoken Hausa, Ithaca, New York: Spoken Language Service, Inc. Heine, Bernd. 1997. Cognitive Foundations of Grammar, Oxford: Oxford University Press. ———. 2008. Using findings on language contact for linguistic reconstruction, Lyon, 13 May 2008 . Junaidu, Ismail, A.U. Kafin-Hausa, A. Muhammed. 2007. Koyon Hausa, Littafi na 1–3, Ibadan: University Press. Lakoff, George, M. Johnson. 1980. Metaphors We Live By, Chicago: The University of Chicago. Ma Newman, Roxana. 1990. An English-Hausa Dictionary, New Haven. Moltmann, F. 2010. Generalizing Detached Self-Reference and the Semantics of Generic ‘One’. Mind and Language 25 (4): 440–473. Newman, Paul. 2000. The Hausa language. An Encyclopedic Reference Grammar. New Haven and London. Yale University Press. ———. 2007. A Hausa-English Dictionary. New Haven and London. Yale University Press. Pawlak, Nina. 2009, Impersonal Subject in Hausa and other Chadic Languages, Studi Maġrebini, vol. VI, 2009, VIII Afro-Asiatic Congress Napoli, ed. by Sergio Baldi, Neapol, Universita degli Studi di Napoli, “l’Orientale”, 195–210. ———. 2009. Conceptualization of Emotions in African languages and the Context of African Personality, [in] Nina Pawlak (ed.) Codes and Rituals of Emotions in Asian and African Cultures, Warszawa: ELIPSA, 95–109. Perry, John. 1990, Self-notions, Logos, 17–31. Perry, John, 1998. Myself and I, in Marcelo Stamm (ed.) Philosophie in Synthetisher Absicht (A festschrift for Dieter Heinrich), Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, pp. 83–103. Underhill, James W. 2011. Creating worldviews. Metaphor, ideology and language, Edinburgh University Press. Yakasai, Hafizu Miko. 2001. Methods of translating figurative language in EnglishHausa translation, Algaita Journal of Current Research in Hausa Studies, vol. 1, no. 1, 21–33.

Embodied Languages and Other Modalities

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Hausa Metaphors: Gestural Idioms Containing Body-Part Terms Izabela Will



Abstract

One of the reasons one can find so many expressions containing body-part terms in the language is the fact that conventionalized movements of particular body-parts became a source for metaphors. Some of them are grounded in a kinesic behavior expressed by a gesture. The paper focuses on the correspondence between gestures recognized by Hausa people from Northern Nigeria and the fixed expressions describing them. These expressions can still refer to a particular gesture, but at the same time connote an abstract meaning connected with the gesture. For example opening the mouth widely expresses astonishment and the phrase describing the gesture buɗe baki (lit. ‘open mouth’) usually has such a connotation. The expression kawar da kai (lit. ‘turn away the head’) is partially lexicalized; it may describe the gesture, but in some contexts its only reading is ‘ignore, turn a blind eye to something’. There are also phrases like ja kunne (lit. ‘pull an ear’) meaning ‘to warn’ that have driven away from their primary function of denoting a gesture and became full idioms.

Our body serves as a universal source domain for metaphors. The shape of particular body parts, their function and location is reflected in a way we talk about direction or how we describe everyday objects. Not only the static form of a human body gives birth to conceptualization of various aspects of our life, but movements of particular body parts and especially conventionalized movements also become a source for metaphors. Many researchers underline the fact that non-verbal communication is a donor domain for the metaphor. As pointed out in Müller and Cienki (2008: 498) gestures my trigger new verbal metaphoric expressions. A concrete action represented in the gesture is a source domain and an abstract concept expressed by it is a target domain. A clear example is a thumb pointing up—a conventionalized gesture in America and many parts of Europe. An abstract concept connected with the gesture is ‘approval’. As noted by Cienki (2008) gestures differ in the degree of conventionality of their forms and functions. “We can speak of a gradient of gestures: from those which have developed fixed meanings in the culture in which they are used © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi ��.��63/9789004274297_���

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to gestures which are produced spontaneously and often unwittingly, and the meaning of the latter (if we can talk about them having meanings) is highly dependent on the context” (Cienki 2008: 6). Conventionalized gestures, such as nodding to mean ‘yes’ are sometimes referred to as emblems, while nonconventionalized gestures, or as McNeill (1992: 6) states it “an image of windmilling arms” are called gesticulation. Both types of gestures occur with or without parallel speech, although nonconventionalized gestures, i.e. gesticulation, is much more speech dependent than conventionalized gestures. The dependency between gesture and speech is well explained in Kendon’s continuum (McNeill 1992: 37): Gesticulation > Language-like Gestures > Pantomimes > Emblems > Sign Languages As stated by McNeill (2009), when “one moves along Kendon’s Continuum, two kinds of reciprocal changes occur. First, the degree to which speech is an obligatory accompaniment of gesture decreases from gesticulation to signs. Second, the degree to which a gesture shows the properties of a language increases. (McNeill 2009: 300)” Some of conventionalized gestures are so common in a given culture that the fixed expressions describing them have entered the lexicon. For example in Poland one makes a single, vertical flat handed up to down wave to show the lack of interest or indifference. The fixed expression describing the gesture machnąć ręką (lit. ‘wave with-hand’) does not only refer to the gesture itself, but also functions as an idiom that means: ‘give something up’. Similarly the gesture of beating one’s breast in order to admit guilt or to prove that one is telling the truth is described as bić się w piersi (lit. ‘beat oneself in breast’). When used in texts the expression bić się w piersi does not usually refer to the gesture, but corresponds to the English idiom: ‘to beat one’s breast’. In some cases the gesture has been already forgotten or is no longer in use, but the expression describing it is found in a given language as is the case with the Polish idiom: rzucić/podniesć rękawice or its English counterpart: throw/take up the glove that means ‘to challenge to battle’. The action of throwing the glove on the ground in front of the person one wants to challenge is known to us from historical sources; no one performs it these days. However the expression throw/take up the glove is used in a contemporary language as a gestural idiom. The term “gestural idioms” used in the paper is defined as “idioms referring to kinesic behavior (. . .) that we can easily accommodate in the concept of gesture” (Hübler 2007: 55). Hübler underlines that not all linguistic expressions can be considered gestural idioms. For example, “out of several English phrases that seem to describe embodied action: keep one’s fingers crossed, frown, pro-

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trude one’s thumb between the clenched index and middle finger, only the first one is a gestural idiom, the other two are respectively: a single lexeme and a free descriptive paraphrase” (Hübler 2007: 55). There are also some idiomatic expressions, eg. ‘pull one’s leg’, that may look like gestural idioms, but in fact have no kinesic counterpart (Hübler 2007: 55). Since many gestures have fixed expressions describing them, one can study them not only by observing people’s behavior but also by analyzing texts. The question of whether there is a difference in meaning when a gesture is actually performed or referred to by words is what the paper aims to investigate. In Hausa culture, one can bite the index finger or say na yi cizon yatsa (lit. ‘I did biting of finger’) and no matter whether the message is kinesic or verbal, its meaning remains the same: one regrets something. But in some cases, once the fixed phrase describing the gesture enters the lexicon, it tends to lose its reference to the action of performing the gesture and becomes an idiom referring to an abstract concept connected with the gesture. It can also change its meaning by undergoing a semantic shift. The gestures discussed in the paper are conventionalized gestures recognized by the Hausa people of Northern Nigeria. All of them are referred to by fixed expressions containing body-part terms, such as ƙirji ‘chest, breast’, kunne ‘ear’, hannu ‘hand’, yatsa ‘fingers’, baki ‘mouth’, ido ‘eye’, kai ‘head’. They either serve as a tool that performs the gesture or refer to the part of the body affected by the hand performing the gesture. By using written and visual data—mainly Hausa films, novels, and news reports—I attempt to track the correspondence between the gestural action and the expression describing it and answer the question about their relation. All the Hausa examples quoted in the article, unless stated differently, come from various texts and have been extracted from the internet by using the webas-corpus method.



Head Movements and Facial Mimicry

Although the term “gesture” often evokes the movements of hands, it does not need to be associated with hand movements only. In fact, most Hausa gestures are performed without the involvement of the hands.1 The reason for that is that gestures are often used to express emotions or a hidden message which should not be noticed by anyone but the recipient. It is easier to send a discreet

1 Out of 80 Hausa emblematic gestures described by Will & Ahmad (2008) almost half of them are performed with the head or face.

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message with an eye or mouth than with a hand whose movements attract the attention of a broader audience. The word for ‘mouth’ is a source of several idiomatic expressions in Hausa, such as sa baki ‘interfere’ (lit. ‘put mouth’), yi baki ‘curse somebody’ (lit. ‘do mouth’). As far as gestures are concerned, there are two expressions including the word baki: buɗe baki ‘open mouth’ and zumɓura baki ‘twist mouth’. The former refers to the gesture of opening the mouth widely often followed by covering the mouth with one’s palm. Zumɓura baki performed by woman only is a facial mimicry that involves shaping mouth in the form of downward ‘u’ and pushing it forward. Buɗe baki expresses astonishment, surprise, shock, while zumɓura baki is a symptom of dissatisfaction or contempt. In all the examples below the expression buɗe baki refers to the gesture, but at the same time it connotes an abstract meaning associated with the gesture—shock or surprise. Note that in all the examples except for (4) the Hausa word for ‘surprise’—mamaki—appears in the close vicinity of buɗe baki as if underlining the meaning of the gesture.2 (1) sun buɗe baki / sautina ta ba su mamaki 3pl-pf open mouth / voice-my 3f.sg.pf give them surprise2



‘[I See] them with mouths agape / My beats have surprised them’

(2) Amina ta ƙifta ido da sauri, ta buɗe baki. Mamaki ya ishe ta da ta ji wannan. A. 3f.sg.pf blink eye with speed 3f.sg.pf open mouth surprise 3m.sg.pf reach her when 3f.sg.pf.rel hear that

‘Amina closed her eyes and opened [her] mouth. She was totally surprised by what she was hearing’ (3) Sakina ta kasa cewa kоme sai buɗe baki kawai ta yi tana kallona cikin mamaki ƙwarai S. 3f.sg.pf be.unable saying nothing but open mouth only 3f.sg.pf.rel do 3f.sg.impf watching-me in surprise really

‘Sakina was unable to say anything, she only opened [her] mouth and watched with astonishment’ (4) Gabana ya faɗi, na buɗe idona sosai game da buɗe baki na ce “Yaya Hammad!”



front-my 3m.sg.pf fall 1sg.pf open eye-my well together with open mouth 1sg.pf say brother H.

‘I was disheartened, I opened my eyes and my mouth and said “Brother Hammad!” ’

The expression buɗe baki has another meaning: ‘to break fast’ or ‘the iftar supper’, i.e. the meal that breaks the day of fasting during Ramadan. Although the meaning is not derived from the gesture expressing surprise, its source can 2 The following abbreviations are used in the morpheme glosses: PF: perfective, IMPF: imperfective, SUBJ: subjunctive, FUT: future, PL: plural, SG: singular, F: feminine, M: masculine GEN: genitive marker, DAT: dative marker, CAUS: causative marker, PREP: preposition, RED: reduplication, REL: relative, DEF: definite marker, PRT: particle, ID: ideophone, 4: fourth person (impersonal pronoun). Proper names are glossed with their first letter, e.g. Amina as A.

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be found in an embodied action—opening the mouth before eating or drinking. The action of opening the mouth before putting some food or drink into it cannot be regarded as an emblem, but rather a symptom. However, since it has the same kinetic and linguistic form as the “surprise gesture”, it is necessary to mention it here in order to show that the two meanings of buɗe baki—‘surprise’ and ‘iftar’ come from two different signs. Examples (5) and (6) show the primary meaning of the phrase buɗe baki—the action of opening the mouth before eating, while the examples (7) and (8) show the meaning derived from this action—iftar. (5) sai ta ce ma Sufyan ya buɗe baki, yana buɗewa sai ta ce “Ka sha!”



then 3f.sg.pf say dat S. 3M.sg.subj open mouth 3m.sg.impf opening then 3f.sg.pf say 2m.sg.subj drink

‘she said to Sufyan to open [his] mouth, when he was opening, she said “Drink [it]!” ’

(6) a yayin da damisa ya buɗe baki zai cinye dila, wannan dila mai wayo ya ce . . .

at time-gen when leopard 3m.sg.pf.rel open mouth 3m.sg.fut eat jackal this jackal having cunning 3m.sg.pf say

‘when the leopard opened mouth to devour jackal, this smart jackal said . . .’ (7) I was entering home just lokacin buɗe baki [at the time of iftar] when one beggar approached me abruptly. (8) Shugaba Clinton ne ya fara wannan al’ada ta yin buɗe baki a Fadar White House

president C. foc 3m.sg.pf.rel start this custom gen doing-gen open mouth at palace WHITE HOUSE



‘President Clinton has started the custom of celebrating iftar in White House’

Another phrase containing the word ‘mouth’ and describing an emblem is zumɓura baki ‘twisting mouth’. When used in texts, the phrase zumɓura baki describes the gesture, but at the same time expresses the abstract meaning— contempt and dissatisfaction. (9) ta zumɓura baki ta ce „Ai kai ma ka gani, ya fi ƙarfina 3f.sg.pf twist mouth 3f.sg.pf say well you prt 2m.sg.pf see 3m.sg.pf surpass power-my

‘She wrinkled her nose and said “Oh, you see, it’s beyond my power” ’

But one can find examples, where the expression zumɓura baki does not refer to the gesture, but only expresses the feeling of dissatisfaction, like in (10) where it describes people’s negative feelings toward the imams. (10) sun fara guna-guni, suna zumɓura baki, suna cewa limamansu sun ba su kunya, 3pl.pf start murmuring 3pl.impf twist mouth 3pl.impf saying imams-gen-their 3pl.pf give them shame



sun karyar da mutuncinsu

3pl.pf break-caus prep dignity

‘they started murmuring, wrinkling up their noses, telling that their imams brought them shame, they humiliated them’

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The gesture described as kawar/kau da kai ‘turning the head’ is often performed by women. When a woman turns her head away from the speaker it either means that she feels shy and confused by the speech directed to her or that she is irritated with the words and feels reluctant to hear them. In the former case, the message is usually pleasing, in the latter, the message is irritating or rough. (11) ya tsaya cak yana kallonta, sai kawai ta kawar da kai 3m.sg.pf stop id 3m.sg.impf watching-gen-her until only 3f.sg.pf turn-caus prep head



‘he stopped, looked at her and she turned her head aside’

The gesture may also be performed by men in situations when they talk to people who are higher in the social hierarchy or when they want to hide their feelings. Avoiding eye contact with in-laws or superlatives is connected with the concept of kunya ‘bashfulness, shyness’, which is crucial to Hausa culture. Thus, the belief, so common in Western culture, that one should look at the speaker is quite uncommon among Hausas. A person who turns his/her head and look aside while listening to someone is considered well-brought up or fainthearted. The phrase kawar da kai is not only used to refer to the gesture. It is also used as an idiom that means ‘ignore; turn a blind eye to something’. Just as the gesture may be interpreted in two ways: to turn the head with a fury or in a fearsome way may also be the reading of the phrase. In (12) and (13), the interpretation is ‘to turn a blind eye to something’ in order to avoid the problem; thus the act is considered negative by the speaker, while in (14) the positive consequence of the act is emphasized. (12) ya yi fatali da zargin da ake cewa Amurka ta kawar da kai daga Afghanistan 3m.sg.pf do disregard with accusation-gen rel 4.impf.rel saying America 3f.sg.pf turn-caus prep head from A.

‘he hurled abuses blaming America for turning a blind eye to Afghanistan’ (13) sun ci gaba da mulki, a yayin da suke kau da kai daga matsalolin rayuwa

3pl.pf eat front prep rule at time-gen rel 3pl.impf.rel turn perp head from problems-gen life

‘da suka addabi jama’arsu  r el 3pl.pf.rel annoy society-gen-their

‘they keep on ruling, while turning a blind eye on real life problems that annoy their people’ (14) don haka ɗaukan matakin kawar da kai daga kuskuren da mace ta aikata

 because.of thus taking-gen steps-gen turn-caus prep head from mistakes-gen relwoman 3f.sg.pf.rel make

ba ƙaramin muhimmanci hakan ke da shi a gareta ba  neg small-gen importance thus-gen 3sg.impf.rel with 3m.sg at for-her neg

‘that is why taking some steps to neglect the faults of the woman is of great importance for her’

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Eyes play an important role in non-verbal communication, because they reflect emotions. In Hausa culture, where verbal means of expressing emotions are often avoided, the facial mimicry is what one pays a special attention to (Will 2009). There are several gestures performed by eyes, such as kallon kallo ‘eye someone up and down’ (lit. ‘watching of watching’), harara ‘contemptous and disapproving side look’, muzurai (lit. cat male) ‘evil look’. Here I focus on the phrases containing the word for ‘eye’—ido—functioning as gestural idioms. Hausa has several expressions for sustained looks—“the eyes remain aimed in one direction for some time and with some intensity without looking away” (Olofson 1974: 31). When someone is impressed by another person, an action or an event, he/she looks at it for a long time, sometimes unconsciously, and may perform a gesture called zuba ido, lit. ‘pouring out the eye’. Zuba ido is often performed when we see something unusual or when we want to discover a secret (Will, Ahmad 2008: 260). The examples (15)–(17) show the situations in which the gaze appears: (15) ya zauna a gefen gadon ya zuba mata ido sannan ya ce: „Yaya me ya faru ne?” 3m.sg.pf sit at side-gen bed-gen 3m.sg.pf pour dat.3f.sg eye then 3m.sg.pf say sister what 3m.sg.pf happen foc

‘he sat at the edge of the bed, gazed at her and said “Sister, what happened?” ’ (16) kowa dai ya zuba wa ’yar yarinya ido ya ga abin da za ta yi.

everyone prt 3m.sg.pf pour dat daughter-gen girl eye 3m.sg.subj see thing-gen rel fut 3f.sg do

‘everyone gaze at the little girl to see what she would do’



(17) na yi saurare amma na ji shiru, na zuba ido amma ban ga komai ba  1sg.pf do listening but 1sg.pf hear silence 1sg.pf pour eye but neg-1sg.pf see nothing neg ‘I was listening, but I heard nothing, I took a gaze, but I saw nothing’

The phrase zuba ido has also abstract meanings; on one hand it means: ‘control’, ‘expect’, ‘pay attention’, on the other: ‘stare at something powerless’, ‘ignore’. It is difficult to understand these two quite contradictory meanings without referring to the gaze that becomes a source of the expression zuba ido. The sustained gaze may be either performed consciously and intentionally or in an unconscious, passive way. For example, when a man wants to show a girl that he likes her, he looks at her for a long time until she realizes his intention and turns her head aside. The element which is clearly intentional and directed toward the interlocutor (the person who is watching wants to attract the attention of an object of his look) seems to give rise to the meaning: ‘pay attention’, ‘control’, ‘watch carefully’ as in (18). But zuba ido can be also performed in an unintentional way—a person stares at something without an intention of attracting attention of an object of his look. This unconscious performance of the gesture would correspond to a meaning ‘stare powerlessly’, “neglect” as in (19)

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(18)  hukumar fasho ta ƙasa za ta zuba ido sosai a kowane lokaci don ganin

 government.agency pension gen country fut 3f.sg pour eye well at every time in-order-to seeing-gen



 an gudanar da komai yadda doka ta tanadar.

 4.pf administer-caus prep everything how law 3f.sg.pf prepare.in.advance-caus



Pension Commission will keep control all the time to see that everything is administered according to the law’

 ‘National

(19)  jinin talakawa na kwarara a Jos. Gwamnati ta zuba ido ba ta ce uffan ba!



blood-gen common.people 3sg.impf leak at Jos government 3f.sg.pf pour eye neg 3f.sg.pf say not.a.word neg

‘blood of innocent is being shed in Jos. Governement is staring powerless and does not say a word’

As noted by Olofson (1974: 31) zuba ido has an element of expectancy, which, I believe, also corresponds to the intentional use of the gesture. (20)  na zuba ido amma ba ka ba ni kuɗina ba (Olofson 1974: 31)  1sg.pf pour eye but neg 2m.sg.pf give me money-my neg



  ‘I waited expectantly but you did not give me my money’

Bargery (1934), the author of one of the first dictionaries of the Hausa language, notes that the meaning of the phrase may change from ‘pay attention’ to ‘neglect’ if the sentence reflects the relation of a superior—Audu in (22) to an inferior—Kande in (22), e.g.: (21)  Audu, Kande ya zuba wa ido (Bargery 1934)

 A. K. 3m.sg.pf pour dat eye

  ‘Audu centres all his affections—or reliance—on Kande’ (22)  Kande, Audu ya zuba mata ido (Bargery 1934)



K. A. 3m.sg.pf pour dat-3f.sg eye

‘Audu neglects Kande (lets her do as she pleases and says nothing)’

The phrase zuba ido used in the imperative mood may communicate to another person that he/she is doing something wrong, e.g. “a person persists in asking questions when they aren’t wanted, or schoolchildren do not understand their teacher, or a man may need to tell his wife to shut up” (Olofson 1974: 31). Perhaps one of the oldest quotations of the gestural idiom zuba ido comes from Fletcher’s (Fletcher 1912) work. According to the author the phrase na zuba maka ido (lit. ‘I poured to-you an eye’) means ‘I rely on you’—a meaning which does not seem to be used these days, as shown in (15) and (16). The examples with zuba ido show that a gestural idiom can undergo semantic shift to such an extent that it is difficult to connect it unambiguously to one meaning. Although all of its meanings can be traced back to the intentional

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or unintentional performance of the gesture, the actual interpretation of the utterance where the phrase zuba ido appears depends on the semantic and pragmatic context as much as the date on which the text was created. Another gaze-related gesture is zura ido (lit. to insert the eye) which refers to looking at someone for quite a long time. It is often a serious, frowning look. The function of the gesture is to protest against the action performed by another person as if waiting for its negative consequences (Will, Ahmad 2008: 260), e.g.: (23)  tsayawa ta yi ta zura masa ido har ya gama.



 stopping 3f.sg.pf.rel do 3f.sg.pf insert dat-3m.sg eye until 3m.sg.pf finish

  ‘she stopped and kept her eyes fixed on him until he finished’

Another explanation of the gesture is given by Olofson (1974: 31) who describes it as “a sustained look associated with looking at something until it disappears (a bucket being lowered into a well), or until it appears (as in the sound of approaching footsteps)”. The meaning ‘watch carefully’ associated with the gesture gives rise to a more abstract meaning ‘to focus’ as shown in (24) and (25), where the idiom zura ido cannot refer to the gesture any longer. This is especially evident in (24) where the idiom denotes an act performed by the computer. (24)  ana zura ma tagogi ido idan linzami ta shiga tagan  4.impf insert dat windows eye if mouse 3f.sg.pf enter window-def

  ‘[computer] windows are focused when the mouse enters the window’ (25)  yanzu an zura mana ido ne a ga ko mun cancanci samun wannan ‘yanci.



 now 4.pf insert dat-1.pl eye foc 4.subj see whether 1pl.pf deserve getting-gen this freedom

  ‘Now everyone is focused on us to see, whether we deserve to get the freedom’

Two gaze-related gestures: zuba ido and zura ido look quite alike. Phonetic forms of both gestural idioms are also similar. It is difficult to state whether phonetic similarity between the phrases or similarity of gestures caused a partial blend of the two expressions. Both can be used interchangeably in some contexts, like in (26) where they mean ‘wait eagerly’. (26)  muna zura/zuba idonmu ga zuwansa  1pl.impf insert/pour eye-gen-our to arrival-gen-his



  ‘we are (eagerly) awaiting his arrival’

There is one more gesture performed with the eyes called zare ido. The verb zare means ‘draw’, ‘pull out’, ‘exhibit’ and Olofson (1974: 31) admits that one of his informants translated the phrase zare ido as ‘to make the eye come out’.

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Will and Ahmad (2008: 259) write that zare ido is looking at someone for a long time with eyes wide open in order to rebuke mainly children. Zare ido as a metaphor denotes harsh talk. (27)  bai biya ni ba kuɗina sai da na zare idanu (Olofson 1974:31)  neg-3m.sg.pf pay me neg money-my until when 1sg.pf pull.out eyes

  ‘he did not pay me my money until I spoke harshly to him’ (28)  ta haka yaran za su fahimci aikin fiye da zare masu ido da yin bulala

 through thus children-def fut 3pl understand work-gen more than pull.out dat-3pl eye and doing-gen whip



 a hannu a tilasta masu sai sun haddace





 at hand 4subj force dat-3pl in.order.to 3pl.pf learn.by.heart

 ‘this way children will understand their work much easier than if someone would rebuke them or whip their hands in order to force them to learn by heart’

Thus, the correspondence between the meaning of the gesture and the metaphor is quite close; the only difference is that the act of reprimanding another person is either conducted verbally or by means of facial mimicry.



Gestures Performed with a Hand

Although many gestures are performed with hands, the word hannu ‘hand’ does not often appears in expressions referring to gestures. Usually it is incorporated in the meaning of the phrase, e. g. the expression buga ƙirji ‘beat the chest’ does not contain the word ‘hand’ although in order to touch your breast you have to use your hand. However there is one gestural idiom containing the word for ‘hand’: karɓa da hannu biyu ‘receive with two hands’. The gesture described by the expression refers to Hausa non-verbal etiquette, which states that every time you are given an object, be it a gift or money, you should take it with two hands. Similarly, when you give an object to another person, both of your hands should be holding it. Taking something with two hands shows not only good manners, but also expresses appreciation. Hence the idiom karɓa/runguma da hannu biyu biyu/bibiyu (lit. ‘receive/embrace with two hands’) means ‘to welcome’, ‘to appreciate’, ‘to receive with open arms’. (29)  don haka ya zama wajibi ne ga masu kuɗi da ’yan boko





 because.of thus 3m.sg.pf become obligation foc for having money and children-gen education

 da Gwamnatocin jihohin Arewa su karɓi wannan harka da hannu bibiyu

 and governing.body-gen district-gen north 3pl.subj receive this issue with hand two-red  ‘that is why it is essential for wealthy and educated and for governors of

to welcome this issue with open arms’

northern states

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(30) to wannan kaddara ce wadda ta riga fata, sai ku rungume ta da hannu biyu biyu well this destiny prt this.f-rel 3f.sg.pf.rel precede hope so 2.pl.subj embrace 3f.sg with hand two two

 ‘well, this is a long awaited destiny, so receive it with open arms’ (31) ‘yan adawa dai ba su rungumi wannan sanarwar da hannu biyu-biyu ba

childen-gen opposition prt neg 3pl.pf embrace this message-def with hand two-two neg



‘enemies did not receive this message with open arms’

Putting an index finger into the mouth and biting it slightly can be considered as an equivalent of a phrase “I shouldn’t have done it”. The gesture is called cizon yatsa ‘biting finger’ and the phrase describing it has become lexicalized and means ‘disappointment’ or ‘regret’. (32)  mu da ba mu je ba sai cizon yatsa  we rel neg 1pl.pf go neg only biting-gen finger

  ‘we who did not go (can) only regret’ (33)  waɗanda suka samu na neman kari, waɗanda kuma suka rasa suna cizon yatsa



 those-rel 3pl.pf.rel get 3impf looking.for-gen profit those-rel prt 3pl.pf.rel be.unable 3pl. impf biting-gen finger

  ‘those who got it are looking for a profit, those who did not, regret’

The gesture called buga/duka ƙirji ‘beat/hit the chest’ is usually performed by men. One hits the chest several times in order to boast or challenge someone. For example a boxer performs it before the fight. The expression is hardly used as a reference to the gesture, it seems to be fully lexicalized and means ‘asseverate’ or ‘be proud of’. (34)  babu wata kabila a doron duniyar nan da za ta buga ƙirji, ta ce ba ta bauta

 there.is.no certain tribe at surface-gen world-gen this rel fut 3f.sg beat breast 3f.sg.subj say neg 3f.sg.pf worship



 wa wani ubangiji nata a gargajiyance ba.



 dat certain god gen-3f.sg at olden.times neg

is no such a tribe in the entire world, which can asseverate it had never worshiped a local god in olden times’

 ‘there

(35)  A yau littinin Brazil za ta fara gwagwarmayar neman cin kofin ƙwallon ƙafar duniya



 at today Monday Brazil fut 3f.sg start struggling-gen looking.for-gen eat-gen cup-gen ball-gen leg-gen world

 ba tare da ɗan wasan da ta fi buga ƙirji da shi ba.

 neg together with son-gen game-gen rel 3f.sg.pf.rel excess beat breast with him neg



 ‘Today Brazil will start struggling to get the World Cup without its best player (lit. ‘the player they were the most proud of ’).’

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(36)  babu wata kabila da za ta buga ƙirji ta ce tana da mata masu yawan haka marubuta



 there.is.no certain tribe that fut 3f.sg beat breast 3f.sg.subj say 3f.sg.ipmf with women having quantity-gen thus writers

  ‘there is no such a society which can be proud of so many female writers’

The gesture called ja kunne ‘pull an ear’ is performed usually by the right hand. The person takes an ear between the thumb and other fingers and pulls it down slightly. However the phrase ja kunne seems to be fully lexicalized and means ‘warn’. It is hardly used as a description of a gesture, or I at least was unable to find an example of such a usage. In the text, it always refers to the meaning associated with the gesture: ‘tell off’, ‘warn’. (37)  wannan shi ne dalilin da Allah ya ja mana kunne domin kar mu bi hudubar  this 3m.sg prt reason-gen that God 3m.sg.pf.rel pull dat-1.pl ear in.order.to neg 1pl.subj follow sermon-gen



 shaytan la’ananne.

 devil cursed

  ‘that is why God warns us in order we do not follow the sinful promptings of the devil’ (38)  ’yan kwadago sun janye yajin aikin jan kunne  children-gen hired.labor 3pl.pf pull strike-gen work-gen pulling-gen ear



  ‘workers suspended warning strike’

What is more, the phrase ja kunne seems to be in a complementary distribution with the gesture itself, i.e. when warning one either performs the gesture or uses the expression na ja maka kunne ‘I warn you’ (lit. ‘I pull to-you ear’). An example from a Hausa film shows the rule. In a scene from the film Ku yanga3 a man called Junaidu warns his neighbor—a young woman, to stop coming to his family house, because her visits always bring quarrels. The characters speak Hausa, but the film also has English subtitles. Looking at the differences between an original text and the translation shows the two various ways of expressing the warning. The Hausa-speaking audience is able to perceive that the warning is two-dimensional: verbal and non-verbal. Junaidu pulls his ear to show the warning and says at the same time: Bari in gaya miki, ki daina zuwa gidanmu ‘Let me tell you [what I think], stop coming to our house’. The verbal part of the utterance does not indicate explicitly the act of warning, but the gesture—pulling an ear—makes it more than clear. The author of the English subtitles seemed to be conscious of the fact that non-Hausa speakers who would watch the film may not understand the gesture and thus he decided to 3 Ku Yanga, directed by Auwal Y. Abdullahi, Nigeria 2010.

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add the non-verbal component of the scene to the English subtitles which is the following: “I am warning you to stop coming back to the house that is the last warning”. The word for ‘warning’ does not exist in the original Hausa text, but appears twice in the subtitles. The translation can be regarded as a blend of verbal and non-verbal utterance of the film character.



Conclusion

Idioms containing references to gestures have a cultural character. Most of these gestures are emblems that are acquired by the members of a given community in the same way they acquire a language. Frequently used gestures acquire “names”—fixed phrases describing them. Just as the gestures are highly conventionalized so are their verbal counterparts—if we want to talk about particular gesture we have to learn how it is called. When such a gestural idiom enters the lexicon, it has two functions: it refers to the action of performing a gesture and to the message encoded by the gesture. Somehow these two functions blend because performing a gesture implies communicating a certain message. Once the phrase starts being identified with an abstract meaning, such as warning, regretting or boasting, there is no need to remember about the gesture that gives rise to the expression and even if the gesture would be no longer in use its trace remains in the language. Many gestural idioms contain words referring to body parts. And body-part terms tend to be associated with expressions referring to certain actions or feelings. In Hausa, eyes are connected with alertness, ears with warning, hand with receiving, mouth with negative emotions or actions. Other, non-gestural idioms confirm these associations. When we look, for example, at idioms contacting the word baki ‘mouth’, such as sa baki or tsoma baki both meaning ‘interfere’ we can see associations with negative behavior. Although the cultural aspect of emblems does not seem to be questioned, there are some trans-cultural resemblances between them. Certain gestures with a fixed meaning are scattered throughout places not connected geographically or culturally. For example, biting one’s finger—the gesture described in this paper—is also used in Italy and just as in Hausa culture denotes disappointment (Diadori 1977: 133). The ear touch is a warning in Greece and Turkey, and in Portugal. As Morris (1985: 84) states “the ear-touch usually means that the performer of the gesture will pull your own ear if you are not careful. It is a warning for children of punishment to come”. Such a description perfectly describes Hausa gesture ja kunne discussed in the paper. Opening the mouth as a result of surprise is quite common. Gestural idioms, such as English open

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mouthed or Polish szczęka opada (lit. ‘jaw falls’) confirm the recognition of the gesture in European countries. References Bargery, G. P. 1934. A Hausa-English Dictionary and English-Hausa Vocabulary, London: Oxford University Press. Cienki, A., Müller, C. 2008. “Metaphor, Gesture and Thought”, Raymond W. Gibbs, Jr (ed.) The Cambridge Handbook of Metaphor and Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 483–501. Cienki, A. 2008. “Why study metaphor and gesture?” Alan J. Cienki, Cornelia Müller (eds) Metaphor and Gesture. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing, pp. 5–25. Diadori, P. 1997. “The translation of gestures in the English and German versions of Manzoni’s I Promessi Sposi”, Fernando Poyatos (ed.) Nonverbal Communication and Translation: New Perspectives and Challenges in Literature, Interpretation and the Media. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing, pp. 131–150. Fletcher, R. S. 1912. Hausa Sayings and Folklore, With a Vocabulary of New Words. London: Oxford University Press. Hübler, A. 2007. The nonverbal shift in early modern English conversation. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing. McNeill, D. 1992. Hand and Mind: What Gestures Reveal about Thought. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. ——— 2009. “Gesture and Communication”, Jacob L. Mey (ed.) Concise Encyclopedia of Pragmatics, 2nd Edition. Oxford: Elsevier, pp. 299–307. Morris, D. 1985. Bodywatching: a field guide to the human species. New York: Crown. Olofson, H. 1974. “Hausa Language about Gesture”. Anthropological linguistics16 (1): 25–39. Will, I., Ahmad, M. 2008. „Symbolika gestów w kulturze hausa”, Nina Pawlak (ed.) Języki Azji i Afryki w Komunikacji Międzykulturowej, Warszawa: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, pp. 243–265. Will, I. 2009. “Cultural Aspects of Nonverbal Code in Hausa”, N. Pawlak (ed.) Codes and Rituals of Emotions in Asian and African Cultures, Warszawa: Elipsa, pp. 252–265.

The Up/Down Orientation in Language and Music Elżbieta Górska



Abstract

The paper discusses the up/down orientation from two perspectives. From the perspective of linguistic coding of up and down as target concepts, body part terms that serve as their most common structural templates are briefly considered. The other perspective takes the concepts of up and down as the source domains for conceiving various target notions which can be expressed not only via language, but also by means of other modalities such as gesture or music. It is argued that the experientially derived up/down image schema (Johnson 1987) plays a crucial role in structuring not only verbal metaphors, but also metaphors which are manifested via the musical mode. Providing insights into cross-modal levels of activation of metaphor, this study sheds a new light on the premise of ‘embodiment’ of meaning. When viewed from the multimodal perspective, the centrality of the body-based conceptual templates in semantic change, which is commonly recognized in cross-cultural studies of grammaticalization and lexicalization appears even more natural.

1 Introduction This paper considers the up/down orientation from two different perspectives. One is that of the linguistic coding of up and down as target concepts while the other is that of metaphorical mappings from the source domain of up/down to a variety of target conceptions, be they well-established or novel. The former perspective is commonly adopted in studies of grammaticalization, when they seek to establish conceptual templates for coding the two deictic notions of up/down (see, in particular, Heine 1997 and Heine & Kuteva 2002). Since this perspective will be of marginal interest here, only the most common body-part-based templates for coding these two concepts will be briefly presented (section 2). We will then move to one example of a grammaticalization chain in which the concept of up itself functions as a template, i.e. a metaphorical source domain, for coding a grammatical marker of comparative. This shift in perspective will provide a frame for section 3, which will consider the concepts of up and down as the source domain for conceiving diverse target notions that can be

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expressed not only via language, but also by means of other modalities.1 The latter perspective is characteristic of a new trend in metaphor research in cognitive linguistics. Until very recently, the numerous proponents of the Lakovian-Johnsonian Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT) (Lakoff and Johnson 1980, 1999)2 have almost exclusively focused on purely verbal manifestations of conceptual metaphor, which can be classified as instances of a prototypical ‘monomodal metaphor’, whose target and source domains are exclusively rendered in one mode (see Forceville 2006: 383). In the last decade, however, interest in multimodal metaphors, wherein “target and source are each represented exclusively or predominantly in different modes” (Forceville 2006: 383), has already gained ground (see, in particular, Forceville 2006, Forceville and Urios-Aparisi 2009, Müller 2008, Cienki and Müller 2008, Zbikowski 2000, 2006, 2008, 2009, and also Górska 2008, 2010).

Given the fact that communication in contemporary society commonly draws on modalities other than language alone, the appearance of this new ‘multimodal’ trend is by no means surprising. Neither is it surprising in the light of the ongoing debate about the nature of metaphor, and its conceptual status in particular. Providing insights into cross-modal levels of metaphor activation, this new trend directly addresses the issue of non-verbal evidence for the conceptual nature of metaphor, and thereby overcomes the circularity of the ‘language—to—thought—to—language’ argumentation of which the proponents of Conceptual Metaphor Theory have often been accused (see e.g. Gibbs and Perlman 2006, Forceville 2006, Müller 2008, Cienki and Müller 2008). The criticism was directed at the standard practice in CMT of hypothesizing about the conceptual nature of a particular metaphor (e.g. happy is up) on the basis of metaphorical linguistic expressions (or ‘verbal metaphors’ as they are also called) and then confirming the very same hypothesis on the basis of a larger sample of linguistic data. It is crucial to also observe that multimodal studies of metaphor which focus on image schematic concepts, such as up/down, shed a new light on the premise of ‘embodiment’, which lies at the very core of cognitive linguistics (see e.g. Johnson 1987, Gibbs 2006, Maalej and Yu 2011a and the literature cited therein). This premise directly refers to the ‘embodied cognition’ thesis, which states that the kinds of concepts we are capable of forming is (to a large

1 ‘Modality’ or ‘mode’ will be understood here in Forceville’s terms as “a sign system interpretable because of a specific perception process” (2006: 382). 2 As for the proponents of CMT, there have been too many who should be mentioned here, so let me only refer the reader to the literature quoted in Gibbs (2008).

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extent)3 determined by the nature of our bodies and our bodily functioning in the world. And, it is implicit in the cognitive view on the conceptual nature of semantics, which maintains that linguistic meaning reflects conceptual structure, and, by the same token, is (to a large extent) motivated by our embodied experience. Last but not least, when placed in the multimodal perspective, the centrality of the body-based conceptual templates in semantic change, which is commonly recognized in cross-cultural studies of grammaticalization (see e.g. Heine 1987, Heine et al. 1991, Heine and Kuteva 2002) and lexicalization (see e.g. Maalej and Yu 2011b), appears even more natural. 2

The Concepts of UP and DOWN in Grammaticalization

Cross-linguistic studies of deictic orientation (see e.g. Heine 1997, Heine and Kuteva 2002) leave no doubt that the spatial concept of up has the human body as its primary conceptual source. Since this deictic model relies on the human body in its upright position (Heine 1997: 38), it is not surprising that the source concept of head is most common in this grammaticalization process. As Heine observes, “87% of all African and 61% of all Oceanic languages that were found to use body-part terms for ‘up’-terms such as ‘above’, ‘up’, ‘on’, (. . .) have grammaticalized ‘head’ for this purpose” (1997: 41). Far less common than this anthropomorphic model is the so-called zoomorphic model which, relying on the body of animal as a structural template, takes the concept animal back as the source of the spatial concept up (ibid.). The concept down, on the other hand, has the body-part model as its secondary source domain, with environmental landmarks (e.g. ‘earth’ or ‘ground’) functioning as the primary conceptual template. In this case, the most commonly grammaticalized body parts are the concepts of bottom (see Heine and Kuteva 2002: 330), buttocks (especially in African languages) and foot/leg (in Oceanic languages, it is the only relevant body-part template) (see Heine 1997: 41–42). For Heine (1997: 139ff), unidirectionality of such conceptual transfer patterns can be accounted for via the mechanism of metaphor, since the source and target concepts have different referents and the shift from the domain of experience of the source concept (e.g. head or bottom) to the domain of the

3 Note that communicative and cultural factors may also be involved in structuring our conceptual system (see e.g. Heine 1997, Maalej and Yu 2011b).

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target concept (cf., respectively, up and down) almost without exception goes in one direction (see also Heine et al. 1991: 226).4 It needs to be emphasized that the unidirectionality claim is not questioned by the semantic evolution from, e.g., the spatial concept up expressed by locative adpositions or suffixes to, e.g., a grammatical marker introducing the standard of comparison (see Heine and Kuteva 2002: 305–306; 326), since in such cases further grammaticalization is involved (and it is not a body part that functions as the target). To summarize, cross-linguistic conceptual templates give grounds for postulating the grammaticalization chain as in (1): (1) body-part term > spatial relation up > grammatical marker of comparative The question of whether this chain can be established within a particular language will not be taken up here as it is not pertinent to our main topic. Note, however, that with the issue of comparatives which evolved from the locational up, we have shifted the perspective and looked at the spatial up not as a target concept, but as the conceptual source of other more abstract conceptions. This perspective will frame the discussion in the following section. 3 The VERTICALITY Schema in Cognitive Studies of Verbal and Multimodal Metaphor Since Johnson (1987) and Lakoff (1987), it is generally acknowledged in cognitive linguistics that our schematic knowledge about the up/down orientation—called the up/down or, the verticality image schema—is first and foremost derived from our preconceptual bodily experience of gravity (cf. Lakoff 1987: 276).5 “Because we exist within a gravitational field at the earth’s surface, and due to our ability to stand erect, we give great significance to standing up, rising, and falling down” (Johnson 2005: 20). The up/down schema is a 4 In grammaticalization literature, the role of conceptual metaphor in the development of grammatical meanings has been a matter of much debate. Other mechanisms which are often mentioned in this context include metonymy, inference and implicature, subjectification; for an overview see, in particular, Brinton and Traugott 2005, and also Langacker 1999. 5 See, however, Mandler (2010), who argues that the concepts of up and down are acquired in the first year of life from the observation of motion of other objects, and are only later enriched by bodily information. Note also that, at the neural level, we have built-in detectors of up and down which are sensitive to the force of gravity (see Grady 2005: 45).

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recurring pattern of such sensorimotor experiences, which helps us organize their diverse instances and reason about them. Like other orientational schemas (e.g. front/back), it is said to be “directly related to the structure and functioning of the human body in its canonical shape, i.e. in the shape in which it presents itself at its best and can function most effectively” (Krzeszowski 1997: 112).6 Crucially, the view that image schemas can be recruited to structure abstract concepts and to reason about abstract domains of thought is among the foundational claims of cognitive linguistics. One of the most evident ways in which image schemas are manifested in language is in structuring conceptual metaphor. Specifically, when put in terms of CMT, the up/down schema provides the source domain for a whole range of conventional conceptual metaphors, such as: (2) happy is up and control is up, which are assumed to be universal (cf. Lakoff and Johnson 1999: 56–57). Their linguistic manifestations abound. Consider a sample of common everyday English expressions in (3a–c), which are motivated by the happy is up metaphor, and those in (3d–f)—by the metaphor control is up: (3) a. That was an uplifting experience. b.  upper (N) ‘a drug, usually in the form of a pill, that people take to make them feel happy, excited, and lively’ (med). c. My spirits rose when I got the news. d. He’s got an upper hand in the situation. e. She holds the highest position in the company. f. How many people are there above you? For our discussion of the embodiment of meaning, the fact that the metaphors under consideration here are included by Grady (1997) in his list of the socalled primary metaphors is of special interest (see also Lakoff and Johnson

6 Typically, the up orientation is associated with positive experiences, while the down orientation—with negative. On these grounds Krzeszowski (1997:113) assumes that the up/ down schema is axiologically charged with plus-minus poles. However, Hampe (2005a) argues against this view claiming, on the one hand, that “axiological dimensions have to remain default values because evaluation is never absolute” (p. 107), and on the other hand, that such default values are determined with respect to much broader and richer, contextualized cognitive models, of which image schema groupings form a part.

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1999).7 The term ‘primary metaphor’ refers to a conceptual mapping between the most fundamental components of basic experiences that recur regularly in what Grady (1997) calls ‘primary scenes’ (see also Grady and Johnson 2002). For example, the metaphor (4) desire/need is hunger is based on the correlation between the sensation of hunger and the desire to find and eat food (cf. Grady 1997, Appendix). Since this primary scene recurs on a constant basis, a very strong binding between the associated components of experience is formed in our mind. In the course of conceptual development (after the phase called ‘deconflation’), such bindings between (formerly) ‘conflated’ components of experience (see Christopher Johnson 1999) give rise to mappings between a primary source concept, which derives from a very basic bodily experience, such as the sensation of hunger, and a primary target concept—a subjective affective response to it—in this case a concept of desire or need. On this account, then, linguistic realizations of the metaphor desire/ need is hunger (cf. e.g. (5)) are direct reflections of this very basic association in experience, and their meaning is thus ‘embodied’ and motivated. (5) a. People are hungry for news. (med) b. The public’s appetite for celebrity gossips seems insatiable. (med) Given our biological make-up we arrive at this primary metaphor automatically and unconsciously by merely functioning in the world we live in. The same argument would apply to the data given in (3). The meaning of these conventional expressions is likewise embodied—the primary metaphor happy is up reflects a strong experiential correlation between the erect body posture or, of being ‘up and doing’ and, the feeling of happiness; on the other hand, the primary metaphor control is up—is based on our finding that when we are in vertical orientation “it is easier to control another person or exert force on an object from above”, since we have gravity working with us (Lakoff and Johnson 1999: 53). Let us now observe that the embodied experience captured by the up/ down schema accounts also for the coherence of the concepts encoded by the

7 In the Appendix, Grady (1997) lists about 100 metaphors which have properties of primary metaphors. For Lakoff and Johnson (1999: 57), on the other hand, it is highly likely that there are at least several hundred widespread primary metaphors.

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verbal metaphors in (6): the ‘opposites’ of the examples in (3a–c) and (3d–f) all receive a ‘downward’ orientation, as is illustrated in (6a–c) and (6d–f): (6) a. All these problems are getting her down. (med) b.  downer (N) ‘something that makes you feel sad or disappointed’ (med)8 c. He is in very low spirits. (med) d. She’s completely under his thumb. e. She holds the lowest position in the company. f. He started his career as a lowly office worker. In this case, then, the embodied patterns of metaphorical thought can be stated as in (7): (7) sad is down; being subject to control (or force) is down9 To sum up thus far, the metaphorical mapping from the image schematic domain of up/down orientation provides coherence to pairs of opposite target concepts happy—sad and having control/force—being subject to control or force.10 Moreover, given the experiential grounding of the underlying primary metaphors, an alternative ‘scenario’, wherein the relevant concepts would receive the ‘opposite’ orientation, appears highly unlikely, if possible at all.11

8 9 10 11

Note that in the derivation of upper and downer, aside the metaphors happy is up and sad is down, also the effect for cause metonymy is involved. This formulation of the control metaphor is after Lakoff and Johnson (1980: 15); see also Lakoff and Johnson 1999. Metaphors of this kind are called “orientational”, since they are motivated by image schematic experience of our bodily orientation in space (see Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 14–21). Recently, the fundamental claim of CMT on the crucial role of image schemas in mental representation of abstract concepts has received empirical support in various cognitive experiments (for an overview see, e.g., Zanolie et al. 2012: 57). For our purpose suffice to note that there is ample empirical evidence showing that the verticality image schema is automatically activated in processing the concept of power; see, in particular, Zanolie et al.’s (2012) study which demonstrates that the activation of the target domain of power (induced by power-related words, such as: attacker, leader, captain vs. victim, slave, looser) shifts visual attention in an image schema congruent way (i.e. in the case of ‘powerful’ words like attacker to the top of the screen and in the case of ‘powerless’ words like victim to the bottom).

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Figure 1

Hieroglyph A-28, The Temple of Edfu, Egypt source: Photo © E. Górska

Seen in this light, the meaning of the ancient Egyptian hieroglyph in Fig. 1 is by no means surprising. As argued by Ahmed (2010: 65), the hieroglyph functions as a classifier which co-occurs with linguistic expressions that symbolize notions from the domain of joy, such as: ‘become excited’/’be happy’ or ‘happiness, joy’. The image of a man with both arms raised above his head that is depicted in the hieroglyph is quite obviously reminiscent of gestures which are commonly used by our champions of sports competition or by ordinary people to express extreme joy and happiness. Such gestures are clearly metaphorical—motivated by the very same metaphor happy is up.12 The Ancient Egyptian example has led us to yet another general observation: given the embodiment of the happy is up metaphor, the fact that its verbal manifestations recur in several unrelated languages is by no means 12

A very interesting visual manifestation of the sad is down metaphor can be found in Müller’s (2008: 77–88) study of a spontaneous speech-gesture combination via which a German speaker described a depressive state of her friend. A striking aspect of the case studied by Müller was that the idea of conceptualizing depressiveness in terms of being down was manifested in the gestural mode only: the activation of sad is down was evident from a series of gestures with a significant downward motion pattern and, at the same time, there was no hint of the activation of this metaphor on the verbal level. This purely gestural (hence monomodal) manifestation of sad is down shows that conceptual metaphors are not restricted to triggering verbal metaphors, but may also induce manifestations in other modalities.

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surprising. Suffice it to mention at this point two examples: one from Hungarian, a Finno-Ugric language (8) and another one from Chinese, (9):13 (8) (9)

Ez a film feldobott this the film up-threw-me This film gave me a high/This film made me happy. Ta hen gao-xing he very high-spirit He is very high-spirited/happy.

Note further that, in Chinese, the concept of success—a notion strongly correlated with happiness—is also understood in terms of the verticality schema: verbal manifestations of the metaphor successful is up or more successful state is a higher location are, according to Yu (2009: 140, note 4), very common; e.g.: the compound word gao-di (literally: high and low) means ‘relative superiority or inferiority (e.g. in a contest or competition)’, and the expression nan fen gao-di (lit.: hard to distinguish between the high and the low) means ‘hard to tell which is better’.14 Let us now shift from the linguistic mode to metaphorical realizations of the up/down image schema in music. The first two examples are drawn from Zbikowski’s (2009) study; they illustrate what musicians call ‘text painting’, in which music accompanying a particular text of a vocal work is meant to suggest or ‘paint’ an image that is referred to in the text itself. The first example comes from the Credo of Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina’s Pope Marcellus Mass, where the text is: “Qui propter nos homines et propter nostram salutem descendit de cælis” (‘Who for us men, and for our salvation, came down from heaven’). Importantly, with the first occurrence of the word descendit, each of the six voices begins a scalar descent. In effect, “Christ’s descent from heaven is (. . .) represented with a cascading fall through musical 13 14

Both examples are quoted in Kövecses (2005: 36–37), the example in (9) is from Yu (1995). A very common non-verbal manifestation of this metaphor has been noted by Yu (2009), who draws our attention to the generally recognized practice in sports competition of distinguishing the first, second, and third place winners of an event by the height of the platform on which they receive their medals or trophies, with the champion’s platform being the highest (see 2009: 140, note 4). Such embodied visual manifestations of the successful is up metaphor are in all likelihood universally comprehensible. The same would also apply to a purely pictorial realization of the metaphor successful career in life is upward movement on journey, which was discussed by Yu (2009: 129–130) in his study of a Chinese educational commercial.

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space, a series of overlapping movements ‘down’ the musical scale” (Zbikowski 2009: 360). For our purpose, it is crucial to note that “[t]his representation exploits the common construal of musical pitches as situated in vertical space, a construal that follows from the characterization of pitches as ‘high’ or ‘low’ with respect to one another” (ibid.). In cognitive terms, this amounts to saying that the up/down schema functions as the source domain for the mapping onto the domain of music. The use of this schema in the characterization of musical pitch is, on Zbikowski’s account, quite straightforward: when we make low sounds, our chest resonates; when we make high sounds, our chest no longer resonates in the same way, and the source of sound seems located nearer our head. The ‘up’ and ‘down’ of musical pitch thus correlate with the spatial ‘up’ and ‘down’—the vertical orientation—of our bodies (Zbikowski 2000: 6). Moreover, the bodily sensations associated with the production of ‘high’ and ‘low’ pitches are, as Zbikowski claims, just one aspect of our embodied experience of musical pitch. Crucially, embodied image-schematic structure of spatial concepts can be metaphorically projected onto the acoustic domain. Specifically, [b]oth space and the frequency spectrum are continua that can be divided into discontinuous elements. In the spatial domain, division of the continuum results in points; in the acoustic domain it results in pitches, [and mapping of the spatial up/down onto pitch] allows us to import the concrete relationships through which we understand physical space into domain of music, and thereby provide a coherent account of relationships between musical pitches (Zbikowski 2000: 7).15 In brief, for Zbikowski, there is a direct bodily motivation for the conceptual metaphor given in (10): (10) pitch relationships are relationships in vertical space. It needs to be emphasized that, even though the conventional way of describing pitch as ‘high’ and ‘low’ might be said to prompt the mapping in Palestrina’s musical passage, there is, according to Zbikowski (2009), far more to this 15

For more on cross-domain mapping of auditory pitch see also Casasanto et al. (2003), Eitan and Timmers (2009).

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multimodal metaphor. Specifically, Palestrina was not merely interested in portraying a move from ‘high’ to ‘low’—he could have achieved this with a single falling interval. Instead, with the help of six voices moving stepwise along a descending scale, he has created a ‘sonic analog’ of “the sound of descent, realized as an orderly, stately process” (p. 361). To corroborate this analysis, Zbikowski considers another example of text painting prompted by the same word descendit ‘come down’ in the Credo of Heinrich Biber’s Missa Christi resurgentis, written about one hundred years after Palestrina’s Mass. The difference between the two musical fragments becomes apparent when we consider Figure 2 (adapted from Zbikowski 2009: 361): the downward path created by Biber consists of fifteen notes and proceeds through a series of twisting turns before reaching its goal. Palestrina, for his part, takes only eight notes, and never changes direction. The sonic image of descent offered by Biber is consequently quite different than that offered by Palestrina. Biber’s descent is a leisurely, almost caressing, affair in which the journey is at least as important as the goal (ibid. 361–362).

Figure 2

Comparison of melodic passages from Heinrich Biber, Credo of the Missa Christi resurgentis, mm. 51–57 and Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, Credo of the Pope Marcellus Mass, mm. 53–55

To recapitulate, the two examples of text painting make it evident that the noun descendit ‘come down’ directs attention to a downward motion through space, yet it does not, as Zbikowski notes, “embody such a process” (2009: 364). At the same time, there is nothing in the two musical passages that imitates the sound of actual descent—a descending scale has little in common with such sound (see 2009: 365). Instead, what the music does contribute are two distinct sonic analogs for the dynamic process of descent, which exploit patterns of pitch going ‘down’ the musical scale, and our understanding of these analogs “is structured by the accompanying text” (ibid.). Or, putting it differently, in these text paintings the mapping from the source domain of text (cf. descendit) onto the target domain of music (employing patterns of descending pitch) makes us “understand” music in a particular way: “we hear the sounds as

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descending” (p. 366). An interesting aspect of these verbo-musical metaphors is that there is also a mapping which goes in the opposite direction: “the music gives the delivery of the words specific contour and duration”, and thereby “shapes our understanding of the text” (ibid.). To substantiate this claim, Zbikowski invites us to consider three situations—descendit spoken; descendit sung by Palestrina’s singers; descendit sung by Biber’s singers, and concludes: “If there are any differences between these three utterances, they come from the structure music can impose on language” (p. 366).16 The final example which I would like to consider is not an established verbo-musical metaphor of the kind illustrated by Zbikowski’s instances of text painting, but a novel metaphor that was openly discussed by its creator. It comes from a lecture delivered by conductor and pianist Daniel Barenboim as part of his BBC Reith Lectures of 2006.17 One of the recurring motifs in his lectures is the claim that attentive listening to music may provide an understanding of diverse aspects of life which are otherwise very difficult to grasp. In cognitive terms, then, Barenboim seems to be saying that metaphorical mappings from the domain of music onto the domain of life can serve to provide insights into our life experiences which are not only difficult to comprehend, but also talk about in terms of everyday conventional metaphors of life, such as: life is a journey, life is a play, life is bondage, life is a burden, life is a flame or life is a fluid (see Lakoff and Turner 1989). When elaborating his life is music metaphor, at one point Barenboim recalls a question that he was confronted with as a small boy living in the Middle East—of why a single event in life may change our perception of whatever preceded it and whatever will follow. He then goes on to explain that he got a clear understanding of this kind of relationship between events from music. Referring to a musical example he later intends to play, he first notes: (11) [T]he moment where there comes a fantastic vertical pressure on the horizontal floor of the music, and that moment you know that the music 16

17

As argued by Zbikowski (2009), the notion of the ‘blended mental space’ postulated by the Blending Theory (see e.g. Fauconnier 1997, Fauconnier and Turner 1998) may serve to grasp the contribution of the verbal and the musical domain to the process of meaning construction which is characteristic of such verbo-musical metaphors. For application of the Blending Theory to multimodal metaphors, see e.g. Zbikowski (2006), Müller (2008), and Górska (2010). For more on this topic, see Górska (2010). For the Reith Lectures archives (which contain both the audio and transcript versions of the lectures and discussions which followed each lecture), see http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/features/the-reith-lectures/archive/.

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cannot continue any more the way it was before, such as the world was not the same after the 9th November of 1938, or the 9th November of 1989, or the 11th September of 2001—events that have changed everything both towards the future and towards the past (L3). The musical example he played to support the verbal argument consisted of a few bars from the last movement of the Ninth Symphony by Beethoven, where the text of the Ode to Joy is: “und der Cherub steht vor Gott, vor Gott” (‘and the cherub stands before God’). Observe that the up/down image schema, and also the force schema (Johnson 1987), are evoked first through language (cf. vertical pressure, horizontal floor in (11)), and then by means of pitch and volume of the music played. This amounts to saying that the up/down image schema currently under consideration has been activated as a source domain that was distributed across both the verbal and the musical mode conjointly in one metaphor. Drawing upon Müller’s (2008: 95–111) approach to verbopictorial and verbo-gestural metaphors, I would regard the relevant correspondence as a verbo-musical metaphor, which can be phrased as in (12): (12)  a critical event (in the course of life) is vertical pressure (on the horizontal floor of music) This correspondence qualifies as a verbo-musical metaphor because of both the distribution of elements of the metaphorical source across two modalities and the crucial role of the verbal context in interpreting the musical example played by Barenboim in terms of the target domain of this metaphor—the conception of critical events in the course of life. In the light of our earlier discussion of the verbo-musical metaphors, the usage of the verticality image schema in example (11) and in the fragment from the Ninth Symphony is motivated by the conceptual metaphor pitch relationships are relationships in vertical space (cf. (10) above). Importantly, the musical passage involves a very abrupt fall down the musical scale, and thereby it functions as—to use Zbikowski’s (2009) term—a sonic analog of Barenboim’s verbal characterization of critical events in life in terms of vertical (pressure). The use of the expression pressure itself indicates that the force schema has also been activated. Since this schema is not directly relevant to our topic we will not go into it in detail. It is interesting to note, however, that the notion of force may be metaphorically understood in terms of the verticality schema (see also (2) and (7) above); this understanding was reflected in Lakoff’s and Johnson’s earlier formulation of the control is up schema, which read: having control or force

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is up and being subject to control or force is down (see Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 15). Observe, further, that the application of the force schema to the music domain might be said to reflect our embodied experience of a higher volume sound whose production requires more force as compared to a sound having a lower volume; in the case in point, the force schema is also motivated by our understanding of the sudden change in pitch and volume in terms of (caused) motion (cf. the metaphors changes are movements and causes are forces). And why is (the floor of ) music horizontal? This might be motivated by the idea of pitch and volume as having one particular level during the relevant musical ‘chunk’ (and with respect to our common experience of force, we could say that here a particular force vector follows a single path of motion);18 when affected by abrupt pressure, such a musical ‘chunk’ can no longer continue in the same way (since the original force-vector has been diverted to a different path of motion). The fact that two modalities are involved in activating the notions of verticality and force increases the degree of contextual activation of the motivating image schemas and of the metaphorical correspondence itself,19 and in effect renders Barenboim’s insight into critical events in life more memorable. Undoubtedly, depending on their musical knowledge and experience, the members of the audience are bound to differ in their understanding of this metaphor. And in particular, for those of the members who are used to attentive listening, the musical mode would provide a far more specific and rich understanding of the metaphorical source than for those members who take music as a mere pastime or background noise. Note, finally, that Barenboim presents this metaphor as his well-established pattern of thought. Undoubtedly, for members of the audience, the understanding of ‘events in life’ in terms of ‘events in music’ is completely novel, and they have to follow his guidance to establish the relevant correspondence on-line. And so, this might be a clear 18

19

On Johnson’s account of the experiential level, forces are always experienced through interaction, usually they have a vector quality and directionality which are typically bound to a single path of motion; they are characterized by degrees of power and intensity; since they are interactional, they always involve a causal sequence (see 1987: 43ff.). In Müller’s (2008) terms, the level of activation is correlated with the number of activation indicators (such as repetition or elaboration on the verbal level or coexpression of metaphor in co-occurring modality): the more metaphoricity indicators surround a given metaphor as it is used online during discourse, the higher its level of activation. Both entrenched and novel metaphors may be activated to different degrees—“depending on the context and on individual speaker/listener’s focus of interest or background knowledge” (Müller 2008: 198).

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case of two alternative ways of activating the same metaphor—as a kind of ‘cognitive routine’ and as a structure created on-line.20 And to conclude this section, let us take a cross-cultural perspective and add that the conceptual metaphor pitch relationships are relationships in vertical space (cf. (10)), which is so common among Western musicians, is by no means universal—cultures do differ here. As Zbikowski notes, the Balinese and Javanese conceptual model of pitches is “focused on the norms of acoustic production: small things typically vibrate more rapidly than large things” and consequently for Balinese and Javanese musicians pitches are ‘small’ and ‘large’, rather than ‘high’ and ‘low’ (Zbikowski 2006: 128). 4 Conclusion To sum up, a few general comments are in order. The centrality of the canonical up-down orientation of our bodies is revealed in many ways. On the one hand, the notions of up and down are among the most commonly coded deictic concepts across languages and cultures. As might be expected, the body-partbased conceptual templates (and, in the case of up the expressions for ‘head’ in particular) are the chief driving force in this grammaticalization process. And, as it was argued throughout this paper, the experientially derived up/down (or verticality) image schema plays a crucial role in structuring not only verbal metaphors, but also metaphors which are manifested in other modalities, such as music. Moreover, the cross-modal analyses presented in this study show that the image schematic knowledge about the up/down orientation motivates well-established verbo-musical metaphors which function as ‘text paintings’ as well as a completely novel metaphor whose source and target domains are distributed across the verbal and the musical mode. It should also be observed that the evidence from metaphors which crosscut different modalities breaks up the ‘language—to—thought—to—language’ circle of CMT, and thereby strengthens the view that metaphor is conceptual in its nature. And finally, cross-cultural differences in understanding musical pitch make it evident that in research on metaphor which characterizes non-verbal modalities, just as in cross-cultural studies of language, in addition to universally common conceptual patterns cultural variants are also to be expected.

20

For a study of metaphor where alternative accounts for the writers and readers are discussed, see Semino (2010).

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References Ahmed, Katarzyna, Conceptual Metaphor: In Search of Universality, Warsaw (MA thesis, University of Warsaw) 2010. Brinton, Laurel J. and Elizabeth Closs Traugott, Lexicalization and Language Change, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2005. Casasanto, Daniel, Phillips, Webb and Lera Boroditsky, “Do we think about music in terms of space: Metaphoric  representation of musical pitch”, Proceedings of the 25th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society, Boston, p. 1323, 2003. Cienki, Alan and Cornelia Müller, “Metaphor, gesture, and thought”. In The Cambridge Handbook of Metaphor and Thought, Raymond. W. Gibbs (ed.), Cambridge (Cambridge University Press), 483–501, 2008. Eitan, Zohar and Renee Timmers, “Beethoven’s last piano sonata and those who follow crocodiles: Cross-domain mappings of auditory pitch in a musical context”. Cognition (2009), doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2009.10.013, 2009. Fauconnier, Gilles, Mappings in Thought and Language, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 1997. Fauconnier, Gilles and Mark Turner, “Conceptual integration networks”. Cognitive Science 22: 133–187, 1998. Forceville, Charles, “Non-verbal and multimodal metaphor in a cognitivist framework: Agendas for research”. In Cognitive Linguistics: Current Applications and Future Perspectives, Kristiansen, Gitte, Michel Achard, René Dirven and Francisco Ruiz de Mendoza Ibàñez (eds.), Berlin-New York (Mouton de Gruyter) 379–402, 2006. ——— “The role of non-verbal sound and music in multimodal metaphor”, In Forceville, Charles and Eduardo Urios-Aparisi (eds.), Multimodal Metaphor, BerlinNew York (Mouton de Gruyter) 383–400, 2009. Forceville, Charles and Eduardo Urios-Aparisi (eds.) Multimodal Metaphor. BerlinNew York (Mouton de Gruyter) 2009. Gibbs, Raymond W., Embodiment in Cognitive Science, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2006. ——— (ed.), The Cambridge Handbook of Metaphor and Thought, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2008. Gibbs, Raymond W. and Marcus Perlman, “The contested impact of cognitive linguistic research on the psycholinguistics of metaphor understanding”. In Cognitive Linguistics: Current Applications and Future Perspectives, Gitte Kristiansen, Michael Achard, René Dirven and Francisco J. Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez (eds.). Berlin-New York (Mouton de Gruyter) 211–228, 2006. Górska, Elżbieta, “Four arguments for patterns of metaphorical thought”, Acta Philologica 35, 15–31, 2008.

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——— “life is music: A case study of a novel metaphor and its use in discourse”. English Text Construction 3/2, 275–293, 2010. Grady, Joseph E. Foundations of Meaning: Primary Metaphors and Primary Scenes. Berkeley (Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Berkeley) 1997. ——— “Image schemas and perception: Refining a definition”. In From Perception to Meaning. Image Schemas in Cognitive Linguistics, Hampe, Beate (ed.), Berlin-New York (Mouton de Gruyter) 35–55, 2005b. Grady, Joseph E. and Christopher Johnson, “Converging evidence for the notions of subscene and primary scene”. In Metaphor and Metonymy in Comparison and Contrast, Dirven, René and Ralph Pörings (eds), Berlin-New York (Mouton de Gruyter) 533–554, 2002. Hampe, Beate, “When down is not bad and up is not good enough: A usage-based assessment of the plus-minus parameter in image-schema theory”. Cognitive Linguistics 16/1, 81–112, 2005a. ——— (ed.), From Perception to Meaning. Image Schemas in Cognitive Linguistics. Berlin-New York (Mouton de Gruyter) 2005b. Heine, Bernd, Cognitive Foundations of Grammar, Oxford (Oxford University Press) 1997. Heine, Bernd and Tania Kuteva, World Lexicon of Grammaticalization, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2002. Heine, Bernd, Ulrike Claudi, and Friederike Hünnemeyer, Grammaticalization: A Conceptual Framework, Chicago (The University of Chicago Press) 1991. Johnson, Christopher, “Metaphor vs. conflation in the acquisition of polysemy: The case of see”. In Hiraga, Masako K., Sinha Chris and Sherman Wilcox (eds.). 1999. Cultural, Psychological and Typological Issues in Cognitive Linguistics. AmsterdamPhiladelphia (Benjamins) 155–170, 1999. Johnson, Mark, The Body in the Mind: The Bodily Basis of Imagination, Reason, and Meaning. Chicago (University of Chicago Press) 1987. ——— “The philosophical significance of image schemas”. In Hampe, Beate (ed.). 2005b. From Perception to Meaning. Berlin (Mouton de Gruyter) 15–33, 2005. Kövecses, Zoltán, Metaphor in Culture. Universality and Variation, Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 2005. Krzeszowski, Tomasz P., Angels and Devils in Hell. Elements of Axiological Semantics, Warszawa (Energeia) 1997. Lakoff, George, Women, Fire and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal about the Mind, Chicago-London (The University of Chicago Press) 1987. Lakoff, George and Mark Johnson, Metaphors We Live By, Chicago (University of Chicago Press) 1980. ——— Philosophy in The Flesh: The Embodied Mind and its Challenge to Western Thought, New York (Basic Books) 1999.

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Lakoff, George and Mark Turner, More than Cool Reason. A Field Guide to Poetic Metaphor, Chicago (The University of Chicago Press) 1989. Langacker, Ronald W., “Losing control: Grammaticization, subjectification, and transparency”. In Historical Semantics and Cognition, Blank, Andreas and Peter Koch (eds), Berlin-New York (Mouton de Gruyter) 147–175, 1999. Maalej, Zouheir A. and Ning Yu, “Introduction: Embodiment via body parts”. In Embodiment via Body Parts. Studies from Various Languages and Cultures, Maalej, Zouheir A. and Ning Yu. (eds.), 2011b, Amsterdam-Philadelphia (Benjamins) 1–20, 2011a. ——— (eds.), Embodiment via Body Parts. Studies from Various Languages and Cultures, Amsterdam-Philadelphia (Benjamins) 2011b. Mandler, Jean M., “The spatial foundations of the conceptual system”. Language and Cognition 2/1, 21–44, 2010. Müller, Cornelia, Metaphors Dead and Alive, Sleeping and Waking. A Dynamic View, Chicago-London (Chicago University Press) 2008. Semino, Elena, “Unrealistic scenarios, metaphorical blends and rhetorical strategies across genres”. English Text Construction 3, 250–274, 2010. Yu, Ning “Metaphorical expression of anger and happiness in English and Chinese. Metaphor and Symbolic Activity 10, 223–245, 1995. ——— “Nonverbal and multimodal manifestations of metaphors and metonymies: A case study”. In Multimodal Metaphor, Forceville, Charles and Eduardo Urios-Aparisi (eds.), Berlin-New York (Mouton de Gruyter) 119–143, 2009. Zanolie, Kiki, Saskia van Dantzig, Inge Boot, Jasper Wijnen, Thomas W. Schubert, Steffen R. Giessner, and Diane Pecher. “Mighty metaphors: Behavioral and ERP evidence that power shifts attention on a vertical dimension”. Brain and Cognition 78, 50–58, 2012. Zbikowski, Lawrence M., “Des Herzraums Abschied: Mark Johnson’s Theory of Embodied Knowledge and Music Theory”, Theory and Practice 22/23: 1–16, 2000 http://humanities.uchicago.edu/faculty/zbikowski/pdfs/Zbikowski_Des_ Herzraums_Abschied.pdf. ——— “The cognitive tango”, In The Artful Mind. Cognitive Science and the Riddle of Human Creativity, M. Turner (ed.). Oxford (Oxford University Press) 115–131, 2006. ——— “Metaphor and music”, In The Cambridge Handbook of Metaphor and Thought, Raymon W. Gibbs, Raymond (ed.), Cambridge (Cambridge University Press) 502– 523, 2008. ——— “Music, language, and multimodal metaphor”, In Multimodal Metaphor, Forceville, Charles and Eduardo Urios-Aparisi (eds.), Berlin-New York (Mouton de Gruyter) 359–381, 2009.

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Data Sources with Abbreviations Used L-3: Lecture 3 “The Magic of Music”, delivered by Daniel Barenboim at the Berlin State Opera, BBC Radio Reith Lectures 2006, http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/reith2006/ lecture3.shtml. MED—Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced Learners (First Edition), Oxford (Macmillan Publishers Limited) 2002.

Case Studies from Africa

∵

Embodiment in Zande Helma Pasch Abstract Body-part terms of Zande have a wide range of metaphorical meanings. Lexical metaphors of the denotations for ‘heart’, ‘head’ and ‘eye’, are used for the expression of emotions and topological relations. Compounds of the terms for ‘side’ and ‘belly’ plus a numeral indicate the number of sides or corners respectively of geometrical shapes like rectangles or cuboids. Terms of animal bodies or bodyparts are the basis of designations for certain architectural shapes. Noteworthy is the usage of the term for ‘hand’ to mark origin from a powerful, source, and the marking of the effect of an action or from an inanimate object. The five spatial concepts of Heine’s scale are expressed by eight bodypart terms and five terms that have landmarks as their conceptual sources. All concepts with the exception of down are expressed by several bodypart terms, while each landmark based term is used for only one specific concept. With regard to Zande the order of the concepts on Heine’s scale has to be modified as follows: down < front < in < up < back.

1 Introduction It is commonly accepted in linguistics that the denotations for human body parts may provide the specific lexical sources for expressions of emotion and cognition (Wierzbicka 1992, Aikhenvald, this volume). They are also used metaphorically in expressions of spatial orientation and temporal relations (Heine, this volume, Heine et al. 1991, Svorou 1994, Heine 1997, Lakoff & Johnson 1980). In many languages, terms for human body parts serve as the major conceptual sources for the basic spatial concepts down, in, up, front, back (Heine 1997: 46). The most frequent pattern of a spatial concept originating in a body part of an animal is up which is derived from the term for ‘back’. It can be observed primarily in languages of pastoral societies. The fact that up is either lexically derived from ‘back’ (i.e. the back of an animal) or from ‘head’ (i.e. head of a human being) suggests that the topological meaning which a body part term acquires is determined by the position of the body part in relation to the major axis of the body. When ‘head’ is the lexical source for up, this correlates with

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi ��.��63/9789004274297_��2

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Pasch

the position of the head at the top of the human body. When ‘head’ is the ­metaphor for FRONT, the human body is conceived of as leaning forward in walking or running (Heine 1997: 46). Alternatively, the spatial concept FRONT derives from the forehead as a frontal body part being directed forward as Heine (1997: 48, Figure 3–5) indicates graphically. The concept may also derive from the head as the frontal body part of an animal. Landmarks such as ‘heaven’ or ‘ground’ are the second source for the basic spatial concepts (Svorou 1994: 79). While some languages derive all of the five basic spatial concepts from body part terms, others use combinations of both sources. According to Heine et al. (1991: 130) there is, however, no language which derives all spatial concepts from landmarks. The order in which the basic spatial concepts are listed, down, in, up, front, back, is a hierarchical scale: down is the category most likely to be derived from a landmark term and back is the least likely. In any given language, if a given category is expressed by a body part term, then all those to its right on the scale are also derived from body part terms (Heine 1997: 47). Zande is no exception to these observations, although in this lan­guage the metaphorical use of body part terms is far less frequent than in other languages, e.g. Ewe (Claudi & Heine 1985, Ameka 1995) or Sango, the national vehicular language of the Central African Republic (cf. Bouquiaux et al. 1978). Nevertheless the language uses a number of body part terms, in particular the terms for ‘eye’, ‘hand’ and ‘tail’, in contexts where they are not found in many other languages. This paper will investigate the body part terms of Zande which are used metaphorically in the above mentioned functions: in expressions of emotions and cognition or as models for geometrical and architectural shapes where the metaphors are purely lexical, and in expressions of spatial, temporal and other relations, where they have undergone grammatical­ization and got new functions as prepositions or adverbs. The paper is organized as follows: After a short overview of the typological characteristics of Zande in section 2, section 3 discusses body part terms in expressions of emotion and cognition, their morpho-syntactic behaviour and semantic-syntactic roles. Section 4 is concerned with spatial and temporal relations metaphorically expressed by body part terms and denotations for landmarks. The highly grammatical func­tions of the body part term be ‘hand’ are the topic of Section 5. Body part terms are also used as numerals or in the formation of numerals whose components and etymologies are analyzed in Section 6. Section 7 presents references to animal bodies or their constituent parts as models of geometrical shapes and architectural constructions. Conclusions are drawn in section 8.

embodiment in zande

201

The Zande data are drawn from various stories collected, translated and edited by Evans-Pritchard (1956, 1962, 1963, 1965a, b, 1974). They have been discussed with speakers of Zande during my fieldwork in Bangassou in 2010. Other data were elicited or recorded in spontaneous speech in Arua (Uganda) with my language consultants Daniel Badagbu and Justin Tambua, and in Bangassou with Gervais Zanga, Pierre Chrysostome, François Mboli­fouye, J. Goto, and P. Katawa. A number of examples were taken from the dictionaries by Gore & Gore (1952) and Lagae & Vanden Plas (1925). 2

An Overview of Zande

Zande is genetically classified as an Ubangian language, Ubangian being a subbranch of the Niger-Congo language phylum. Zande is spoken by about one million speakers in the Sudan, Central African Republic (CAR), and DR Congo triangle. Globalization has caused large groups of Zande to move to the urban centres of these three countries as well as neighbouring countries and overseas. In the 18th and 19th century, when the Zande were politically influential, their language was an important lingua franca. This function has been lost in all three countries and has been adopted by Sudan Arabic in South Sudan, Swahi­li in DR Congo, and Sango in Central African Republic. In South Sudan Zande is used as a written medium by the Christian missions, but in DR Congo and in CAR this is not the case. The language is fairly well documented. There are a number of general grammatical descriptions (Gore 1926; Tucker 1959; Boyd 1980) and specialized studies (Claudi 1985; Boyd 1995; 1998; Pasch 2007, 2011, 2012 a, b, 2013, 2014, Pasch & Mbolifouye 2011). Zande has eight vowels phonemes: /į, i, e, ä, a, o, u, ų/ and unlike the other Ubangian languages Zande has ±ATR vowel harmony. The syllable structure is [CV]C(w)V, i.e. there are only open syllables. Tone is both lexically and grammatically relevant. The language has a rich derivational and compositional nominal mor­ phology, but no nominal inflexion. The four-gender system (masculine, feminine, animate (non-human), inanimate) is marked only on 3rd person pronouns. Zande verb morphology is characterized by a complex TAM-system and a number of extension suffixes. There are two morphological verbs classes: one distinguishes between a perfective and an imperfective stem while the other does not. There are two series of personal pronouns. The pronouns of series 1 are used in subject position and those of series 2 in object position. The pronouns of

202

Pasch

series 1 are also used in alienable possessive constructions, and those of series 2 in inalienable possession of body parts. Certain kin and affinal relations are again expressed with pronouns of series 1 (Pasch & Mbolifouye 2011). The basic word order is SVO, and the structure of the noun-phrase is PL-DEF + ‘other’ + ADJ + PL-Noun + NUM/QUANT + DEM. Quanti­fiers, numerals and the demonstrative float, however, quite frequently to the right into a position of an adverb (Pasch 2014). Grammatical relations are defined by the order of constituents. Only personal pronouns, with the exception of those referring to HUMAN antecedents, are morphologically marked for their syntactic functions. Other syntactic relations are indicated by prepositions or adverbs. Zande has a rich system of tense and aspect marking prefixes. 3

Cognition and Emotion

Universally languages employ different body parts as containers for emotions and intellectual capacities or instruments producing feelings or ideas. In English, for instance, the body part term ‘heart’, is associated with a wide variety of expressions relating to emotional or mental activities and appears in different grammatical constructions. It may co-occur with qualifiers to render expressions such as ‘warm-hearted’, ‘cold-hearted’, ‘soft-hearted’. Syntactically, ‘heart’ may function as the subject of intransitive clauses, e.g. ‘one’s heart jumps/sings with joy’, ‘one’s heart falls apart’, and ‘one’s heart stands still with deception/grief’, ‘one’s heart beats with happy expectation/fear’. In expressions like ‘to have no heart’ or ‘to set one’s heart on something’ ‘heart’ syntactically functions as head of an object noun phrase. In the expressions, ‘to act in a heartless way’ or ‘to play on one’s heart strings’ ‘heart’ is part of a peripheral constituent. Languages differ in their selection of body parts for the expression of specific emotions and cognitive patterns as well as in the choice of verbs, adjectives and adverbs that may be combined with the respective body part terms. Nevertheless certain characteristics are almost uni­versally ascribed to specific body parts. The heart for example is quite commonly the seat for affection, humor and courage while intellect and knowledge are located in the head. In Zande, ngbadu-se1 ‘heart, chest’ can be used to express feelings, but not frequently. The speakers normally express their feelings by means of the verb 1 Body part terms in their citation form have often, albeit not always, a suffix –se, which is replaced by a pronoun of series 2, marking the possessor (Pasch 2011: 214) or by a noun

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embodiment in zande

bera ‘think, estimate, feel in one’s heart’. When they actually speak about feelings in combination with ngbadu ‘heart’, it is done in a metaphorical way. This strategy can be considered typical with respect to internal organs since these evoke “imaginary bodily images” describing non-observable actions or processes taking place inside the body (Wierzbicka 1999: 297–302, Yu 2002). (1)

Wi ngbadu-ko well.cooked heart-3m ‘he is courageous’

(2)

ngbadu-ri zera heart-3f be.cold ‘she is calm, at peace’

gbe very

It must be noted that without qualification by an adjective (1) or by the action of a verb (2), ‘heart’ need not be understood as a container of friendliness, but it can also be one of evil intentions (3). The compound boro-ngbaduse (personheart) ‘selfish, grasping person, beggar’ confirms that the equivalent of ‘heart’ does not have a basic notion of friendly feel­ings. (3)

Wa how

ka SUB

mi 1s

za start

ka SUB

birika-ro deceit-2s.2

mi 1s

ka SUB

igi hide

mi biriki kina ku ti ngbadu-re. 1s deceive just DIR at heart-1s.2 ‘How I would go about to deceive you: I would keep my deceit [I would hide and deceive] in my breast.’

The head, ri, is referred to in expressions of emotions more often than the heart. It has neither the notion of positive nor of negative emotions in and of itself, but the quality of the emotions depends on the adjectives that modify ‘head’ or the verbs that affect it (4).

referring to the possessor. If the last syllable of the stem begins with /r/, as in vuru-se ‘belly’ it is dropped before pronouns which begin with /r/, e.g., –re ‘me, my’ or -ro ‘you (obj.), your’. In this paper body part terms are given without the suffix se- except in the contexts where it is required.

204 (4)

Pasch manga nyaka make strong ‘be stubborn’

ri head

When nominalized, such constructions denote character features of persons, e.g., nyaka-ri (strong-head) ‘obstinacy’. Being an external body part, ri allows verbs describing emotions as actions or processes which Yu (2002: 349) characterizes as “supposedly visible”, such as “being in flames”. In many Trickster stories the protagonist Ture, driven by greed and envy, invests all his physical and mental strength because he wants to achieve his goal at any price. The description of this furious fervor is that of a burning head. (5)

ko 3m

ki SEQ

mere walk

pa-vuru side-belly

di river

ki SEQ

za launch

ka ba a-tio wa ri-ko na-gbi. SUB throw PL-fish like head-3m II-burn ‘He went along the river and began to catch fish as though his head was on fire.’

The head is the only body part the burning of which expresses meta­phorically a feeling of anger or fury. This fury, which may result from panicking in a highly unfavorable situation as in example (5), affects only the owner of the head. When similar fury is directed towards another person the furious person is described as burning in the direction of the other person (6) without reference to the head. (6)

ko ki gbi ku ti Kperende ni-ya, 3m SEQ burn DIR at Cicada. X-say ‘. . . and he became furious with Cicada, saying . . .’

In expressions of emotion and cognition, the term for ‘eye’ appears more frequently than the denotations for ‘heart’ and ‘head’ is that for ‘. The denotation for ‘eye’ is more frequent in expressions of emotions and cognition than ‘heart’ and ‘head’. In such expressions the eye, an external body part, is the subject of supposedly visible actions. It is not only conceived of as a container into which a person other than the owner of the eye, can fill emotions (7), but also as a body that may be transferred from one place to another by another person (8) or that can explode (9). The owner of the eye who is affected by emotions is not encoded as the subject of the respective actions, which reflects that s/he has neither control over the given situation nor over the—quite violent—emotions that it provokes in him/her.

205

embodiment in zande (7)

. . . ka ba iliwa-a ku bangiri a-vuru Yakpati SUB throw fear-INAN2 DIR eye PL-subject Y. ‘[N. did this] to strike terror into the hearts of Yakpati’s people.’

(8)

Ri di bangiri-ko 3f take eye-3m ‘she fascinated him’

(9)

. . . bangiri-ko ki su. eye-3m SEQ explode ‘[When Ture saw these yams] greed overcame him.’

koyo there

du be

ri 3f

ni ANAPH

While emotions located in the eye are beyond the control of the owner, s/he does have control over intellectual activities and hope which are likewise located in the eye. S/he is encoded as the subject carrying out actions with the eye (10, 11), and may even be the addressee in an imperative (12, 13). (10) mi na-baka bangi-re 1s.1 II-assemble eye-1s.2 ‘I am thinking about it.’ (11) mi na-ma bangi-re 1s.1 II-put eye-1s.2 ‘I am hoping2 for rain.’

ti at

tipa for

gi DEF.P

pai matter

re DEM

mai rain

(12) mo dua bangi-ro ti gi pai . . . 2s.1 build eye-2s.2 at DEF.P matter ‘Put your attention to this matter [which I am telling you about].’ (13) mo mai bangi-ro ku 2s.1 put eye-2s.2 DIR ‘still hope for [that thing]’

mbata ahead

yo there

kindi continually

tipa . . . for

The examples indicate that bangiri does not only denote the location of intellect and hope, it is in itself a metaphor for intellect. Gore & Gore (1952: 11f) only offer ‘mind’ as a possible translation, but in expressions like (14, 15) bangirise clearly has the meaning ‘thought, attention, thinking capacity’. The citation 2 The basic meaning of ma bangirise is ‘to look for’.



I 3p

a-ma-ki III-put-FREQ

bangiri-yo eye-3p

They looked for their chief.

tipa for

ga-yo POSS-3p

gbia chief

206

Pasch

form is used here because there is no part-whole relationship between the 2nd person and bangirise ‘capacity to think’. The speaker rather asks his interlocutor whether there is any ‘capacity to think’ in him, expressed in a topological construction. Any question about the interlocutor’s eyes would require a possessive construction. (14) Bangiri-se ti-ro te? eye-SUFF at-2s.2 NEG ‘Have you no thought?’ (15) bangiri-se ti ni te eye-SUFF at ANAPH NEG ‘thoughtless(ly), there is not thought in it’

The thinking capacity can be made use of in various ways. This can be expressed by transitive verbs which supposedly manipulate the eye by putting it in specific positions, e.g. ru bangiri-se (plant eye-SUFF) ‘be clever’ or dua bangiri-se (erect eye-SUFF) ‘pay attention’ (16, 17). These infinitive constructions can be nominalized to create highly abstract terms, e.g. ru­bangirise ‘cleverness, exactitude’. When used in context the suffix –se is again replaced by a possessive pronoun or a noun referring to the owner. In subject position rubangirise may supposedly become self-acting in maintaining its position, and stand upright’3 (16). (16) ru-bangiri-ko a-ru ni rengo plant-eye-3m III-stand MANNER truth ‘He is truly clever.’ (his cleverness stands truly) (17) mo dua bangi-ro ti gi 2s.1 erect eye-2s.2 at my ‘Fix your attention to my words.’

pai matter

A person’s impressions about certain things which come to his/her mind without effort are, from a linguistic point of view, treated similarly to emotions insofar as the owner does not have control over the situation. They are located in the eye, have a certain quality and are referred to by the subject (18).

3 Ru is a labile verb ‘stand (upright), put s.th. in an upright position’.

207

embodiment in zande (18) si a-kia INAN.1 III-be.different ‘it is different to my mind’

bangi-re eye-1s.2

General impressions cannot be located in one’s eyes. Because there is no definite person affected who could be referred to, the impressions are themselves called bangirise in the citation form, which now constitutes the predicate (19). (19) si bangiri-se INAN.1 eye-SUFF ‘it seems that’

wa like

Lack of control is also associated with forgetting pieces of know­ledge, which is expressed as ‘matters departing from the eye’ (20). We may assume that they move metaphorically behind the eye where they are not visible they are recoverable, they remain secret: gi bangirise (back eye) ‘in secret’.4 (20) Pa ime ki go matter water SEQ go.away ‘They even forgot about the water.’

4

a-go4 III-go.away

bangiri-yo. eye-3p

Locative and Temporal Relations

The denotations for ‘heart’, ‘head’ and ‘eye’ are not only used in expres­sions for emotions, but also for spatial relationships, a function which they share with an additional number of body part terms that are not used to refer to emotions. Just as ngbadu ‘heart’ does not play a major role in the expressions of emotions, it is of relatively little importance for the expression of spatial relations. It is used to express the concept in, but not for the description of a figure being inside a three-dimensional ground,5 a situation which is expressed in many languages by the respective terms for ‘heart’ (Svorou 1993: 75). Only one example could be found where ngbadu is used to describe the position of a figure in the centre of a physical space, more speci­fically in the middle of the back of a shield which is invisible to the beholder (21). It is conceivable that the invisibility of the heart as an internal body part makes it a 4 Repetition of the main verb by the same verb with the prefix a- is a marker of emphasis. 5 The terms ‘figure’ and ‘ground’ are used according to Talmy (1985).

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model for that example. The shield covers the area behind and at the centre of which the hand holds the spear so that it cannot be seen. (21) . . . ki gbe be-ko na ni ku ngbadu SEQ brandish hand-3m with ANAPH DIR heart ga-ko vura. POSS-3m shield . . . and [he] brandished his hand with it [the spear] behind the centre of his shield.

In a number of African languages the concept in is described by means of the term for ‘belly, stomach’ (Heine et al. 1991: 130, Svorou 1993: 71). This metaphor is also found in Zande, though not in many examples, all of which describe three-dimensional insideness, e.g. vuru6 dimo ‘interior of the house, room’, vuru kporo ‘courtyard of a residence, inside of the village’, vuru kporo diwi ‘halo, area enclosed by the halo around moon’. The three-dimensionality becomes also apparent in compounds like pa-vu-se ‘side of the body’, pa-vuru-ri (sidebelly-head) ‘temples’. This three-dimensionality is also apparent in compounds like pa-vu-se ‘side of the body’, pa-vuru-ri (side-belly-head) ‘temples’. The nearly total restriction to three-dimensional situations might be due to the notion of vuru as a compact body (5, 22) besides that of a hollow body (23). (22) Ani na-da pa-vuru di we II-arrive side-body river ‘We arrive at the left side of the river.’ (23) Mo ngere vuru bukuru 2s.1 look inside box ‘Look inside the box (there).’

ku at

gare left

be. hand

yo there

Vuru is documented in only one expression with a non-topological meaning, vuru-be ‘in the power of’. Here vuru is combined with be (originally ‘hand’) ‘­territory, power, influence’. The basic meaning of the compound is ‘palm, inside of hand’ (cf. Section. 6).

6 The citation form is vu-se or vuru-se.

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embodiment in zande (24) Gi pai a-tona vuru-be DEM.P matter III-begin belly-hand ‘This affair started through the chief.’

gbia. chief

In the vast majority of cases, insideness—whether three- or two-dimensional—is expressed by the preposition rogo ‘in’ (25), the origin of which is not clear. Rogo is also used to express the change from one category (species, language) into another (26, 27). (25) Mo uka ime ku 2s.1 pour water DIR ‘Pour water into the bottle.’

rogo in

kambu bottle

yo. there

(26) A-zande kpi, i sa ti-yo rogo PL-Z. die 3p change REFL-3p in ‘When the Azande die they turn into animals.’ (27) Ani na-sa-ha ku rogo 1p.1 II-change-INAN.2 toward in ‘We are translating it [the Bible] into Zande.’

nya. animal

pa-Zande. speech-Zande

The topological position of a figure in the middle of a flat space is expressed by bangiri-se ‘eye’. ‘Middle of a space’ may mean the line that is equidistant from the two sides of a linear space, e.g. a road, which is narrower than it is long (28), or the current of a river (29). An exception is bangiri we (eye fire) ‘in the fire’ which describes the position of a log in the flames. (28) mo ndu kina bangiri gene 2s.1 go just eye path ‘go only in the middle of the path’

(29) Kurungba da bangiri di awere. canoe arrive eye river now ‘The canoe has now arrived in the current.’

However, bangiri does not only refer to the position in the middle of an item. It may refer to the surface of still waters (30) or the presence of one person in front of another (31). In a non-locative sense bangiri may refer to the important point in a discussion’, e.g. bangiri fora (lit. eye word) ‘piece of advice’.

210 (30) mo bi nga gbiwi du bangiri 2s.1 see REV duck be eye ‘See the duck on the surface of the water.’

Pasch ime. water

(31) Mo sungu bara bangiri-ko. 2s.1 sit place eye-3m ‘Sit down in front of him.’

Furthermore, bangiri may refer to the highest part of a growing thing, i.e. the top of a complex body when that body has acquired its final shape, e.g. bangiri moru ‘head of eleusine’, bangiri ngbaya ‘head of maize’, bangiri oro ‘head of an ulcer’. Ngba ‘mouth’ looks like a synonym of bangirise in some compounds and like an antonym of it in others. In a number of compounds the starting point of items is referred to by ngba, e.g. ngba-di (lit. mouth-river) ‘source’, ngbawirinzaga (lit. mouth-finger) ‘finger-tip’. Instead bara-ngba (lit. place-mouth) ‘in front’ refers to the area in front of some­thing or someone (32). No other compound is known where ngba is used in this sense. (32) Ko sungu bara-ngba-ko. 3m sit place-mouth-3m ‘He sat in front of him.’

It is probable that ngba has not grammaticalized into a preposition referring to the area ‘before, in front of’ something or someone because this function is carried out by bangiri and by the locational and temporal preposition mbata, ‘in front of, before, formerly’. The origin of mbata, which also functions as an adverb, is not clear. However, the mouth is not only a frontal body part, but it constitutes a border where certain things (food, drink, inhaled air) enter the body, and where other things exit it (words, saliva, exhaled air). This notion of a border which is crossed on the way from one space (outside) to another (inside), or from one element (air) to another (water, fire), has led to the notion of ngba as ‘(be)side’ (33) or ‘edge, riverbank’ (34). (33) ti ngba we at mouth fire ‘near, beside the fire’

211

embodiment in zande (34) ko de vu-ri ti ngba ime 3m cut belly-3f at mouth water ‘. . . he cut open her belly at the edge of the water’

While ngba refers to the border close to the deictic centre, the far end is referred to by ri ‘head’ (35). (35) mangu na-du ni asiasi-e ti ri ati bag II-be ANAPH hang-INAN.2 at head field ‘. . . [his] bag which was hanging at the end of the cultivation.’

yo. there

Normally ri refers to the upper part of objects, e.g. ri we ‘on the fire’, or the location of a figure on or above a ground ri mbisa (head-table) ‘on the table’ or the motion over a ground (36). (36) . . . wa ka toro a-ndu ri sende. like SUB spirit III-go head ground ‘[she came] like a fairy queen walking on the ground.’

Ri, ‘head’, is not the only conceptual source of Up; the landmark term uru ‘sky’ is another one. To the best of my knowledge the preposition or adverb auru ‘on, above’ and ri are used in the same contexts in order to describe the position ‘on s.th.’ or ‘above s.th.’, and both occur with similar frequency. Only one speaker gave an example referring to the head as the place of memory and knowledge (37), as is the case in Sango, ri ti lo a-woko (head POSS 3s soft) ‘he is intelligent’ and French e.g. il n’a pas de tête ‘he is forgetful’, il n’a rien dans la tête ‘he lacks intelligence’. This speaker lived for several years abroad and did his university studies in French. It is conceivable that the metaphorical usage of ri ‘head’ to mean ‘intelligence’ is an interference from French or Sango or from both. (37) . . . ka kε̃ kura a-gu pai na-ye ku ri-yo. SUB write other PL-DEF.D matter II-come DIR head-3p ‘. . . in order to write down the things which they remember.’

The concept back has also two conceptual sources. The first is gi-se, the back of the human body. As a noun it denotes the back part of s.th., e.g., gi bambo ‘backside of the house’, and as a preposition it refers to the area behind an

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Pasch

object, where things cannot be seen (38). In a meta­phorical sense, it may refer to the back parts of non-physical items, such as a language, which from this position cannot be understood (39). We may assume that the position of an object described by gi is not just situated behind an item, but that it is physically and mentally inacces­sible. This assumption is confirmed by the expression gi bangirise ‘in secret’ (40). (38) Mo 2s.1

ndu go

ka SUB

sopa clear

bina field

gi back

gu DEF.D

bambo house

du be

yo re there DEM ‘Go and clear the field behind that house (which is) over there.’ (39) I na-pe pa-zande gi-he yo 3p II-speak langue-zande back-INAN.2 there ‘They speak Zande incorrectly [i.e., at its back/behind it].’ (40) ka mo mangi nga SUB 2s.1 do NEG ‘Do not do it behind my back.’

ha INAN.2

gi behind

bangi-re eye-1s.2

ya. NEG

A second conceptual source for back is sa ‘(an animal’s) tail’. The grammaticalization of this bodypart term does not have many parallels in other languages.7 Unlike gi it is not restricted to spatial relations, but it can also be found expressing temporal relations. In the compound adverb ku-sa-yo (DIRtail-there) ‘over there; thereafter, later’ it may refer to a place distant from the speaker or a moment later than that of speaking. (41) sunga kusayo sit there ‘stay behind’ (42) oni ye kusayo 2p.1 come there ‘come (PL) later.’

The preposition sa refers to places which are located at some distance from the speaker frequently follows verbs of motion (43, 44). This is not in agreement 7 On the basis of Owens’ (1985: 142f) data O’Dowd (1992: 74) claims that the term for ‘tail’ in Harar Oromo has developed by grammaticalization into a temporal conjunction.

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embodiment in zande

with Svorou’s (1994: 204) observation that directional concepts “are invariably associated with the landmark model” (cf. example (48)). (43) mi ndu sa nya 1s.1 go after animal ‘I go for a wild animal’ (44) mi na-ndu 1s.1 II-go ‘I go to work’

sa after

sunge work

In example (43) sa may be understood either as a local preposition or as a purpose marker, but in example (44) its function is definitely that of a purpose marker. The conceptual source is the noun sa in the sense of ‘reason, cause’ as in sa du re (reason be here) ‘here is the reason of it’. (45) Sa kwata nga gine tail fight COP what ‘What is the reason for this battle?’

A semantic shift ‘tail’ → ‘reason, cause’ is not very like­ly. However, this is not a unique example: a similar use of these same three body part terms ‘head’, ‘leg’ and ‘tail’ and—in addition—‘mouth’, all of which are extremities of the body, is documented for Basque (Ibarretxe-Antuñano 2001: 478). An explanation is given by Lagae & Vanden Plas (1925: 137) who state that sa in sa ngbanga (tail palaver) “fond de la palabre” may be replaced by ri ‘head’, or ndu ‘foot’ without any difference in meaning. They add: “Quand on tient la palabre par la queue, ou par la patte, ou par la tête, on voit clair”,8 and thereby ascribe to the palaver a number of zoomorphic features. The following examples show that terms other than ngbanga which refer also to problems under discussion, e.g. pai ‘matter, affair’, can likewise supposedly have body parts (46) represent­ing their cause. (46) ndu gu pai nga gine? foot DEF.D matter COP what ‘What is the cause of this matter?’ (47) ngbanga kuru ri gu pai palaver appear head DEF.D matter ‘A palaver developed because of this affair.’

re DEM

8 “When you take a palaver by the tail, or the paw or the head one sees clearly.” (Translation by David Roberts).

214

Pasch

Evidently it is denotations for the extremities that are used to refer to the cause or the point of a problem or discussion. With regard to the human body these are the head, the arms and the feet, with regard to an animal body it is the head, the feet and the tail. In the contexts of motion and of temporal relations the concept back may also be expressed by the landmark term fuo or fwe ‘trace’. It is about as frequent as sa with which it is synonymous as the examples (48), (49), (50) show (cf. (42) and (43). (48) mo ndu fwe-ko 2s.1 go trace-3m ‘I went after him.’ (49) mi na-ndu fwe 1s.1 II-go trace ‘I am going to work’

sunge work

(50) i bangita de fuo kumba 3p give.birth woman trace man ‘a girl was born after the boy’ (Landi)

The concept down at the left side of Heine’s hierarchy is frequently expressed by the landmark term sende ‘ground, earth’. Only rarely is rumbu-se ‘buttocks’ used in that function, e.g. rumburu akoro ‘bottom of the pot’. 5

Special Case, the Denotation for ‘Hand’

The denotation for ‘hand’, be, differs from the other body parts terms discussed in this paper in that it is not used to describe mere local rela­tions, but alienable possession and situations which are determined by power. The grammaticalization process of the body part term to become a preposition is outlined in what follows. Possession of an item is described in many languages as holding it in one’s hand (Heine et al. 1991: 34). This image is linked to the notion that the acquisition of an object is prototypically carried out by taking it into the hand (51). In Zande the hand functions as a tool for taking hold of things, and it has an inside (vuru-be ‘palm’, cf. ex. 24) that renders it a container where they are kept. The supposed location of the possessed item in the owner’s hand is expressed by the copula du ‘be somewhere’ (51).

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215

(51) . . . ko ki di wiri-gaza, ki zadi-he be-ko. 3m SEQ take small-drum SEQ hold-INAN.2 hand-3m ‘. . . and he took a little drum and carried it in his hand.’ (52) Dungu a-e du be A-mbomu nga gu many PL-thing be hand PL-Mbomu COP DEF.D i a-bi kina be kura a-boro kia. 3p III-see just hand other pl-person ? ‘Many things the Ambomu possess (in their territory) are what they have seen in the territories of other peoples.’

The notion of taking hold of an item in order to obtain possession of it has been metaphorically extended to the acquisition of items which cannot physically be seized, among other things geographical entities, such as roads or territories. Here, possession of an item may have the notion of control rather than of alienable ownership. (53) Si du i ki ni-di kina Sue ku be-yo. INAN.1 be 3p SEQ X-take only S. DIR hand-3p ‘For this reason they migrated following the course of the Sue.’

Such control indicates that the owner of the road or area is powerful. It is be, grammaticalized into a preposition which introduces the power­ful owner. In most examples this person is dangerous for those who approach him or her. The territory in his control need not be mentioned, but may be understood if the danger emanating from the owner or controller is in focus. In example (54) it is the place of a famous yam-planter, a wicked old woman, where men who go to eat yam to eat have to submissively ask for it. (54) . . . u ni-ye ka li gwara be-ri LOGs.1 X-come SUB eat yam hand-3f ‘[. . . that] he had come to eat yam at her’s (i.e. her place)’

In example (55) be does not refer to definite places in specific owner­ship, but to any place where elephants and buffalos happen to be and which is therefore dangerous for any other creature. (55) Oro be a-mbara ti ku be a-gbe. run hand PL-elephant fall DIR hand PL-buffalo ‘Running away from elephants is falling among the buffalos.’

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Pasch

In a more grammaticalized reading be may introduce inanimate items, which are in no relation to a territory. In these contexts, it is irrelevant whether they belong to somebody or not. Even processes or actions (56, 57) may be introduced by be. What is important is that they constitute the causes of usually negative effects. (56) be-re ma be pene gita hand-1s.2 blister hand handle hoe ‘My hand is blistered by the handle of the hoe.’ (57) . . . ka kumba-ri gbere be ga-ri pai SUB husband-3f be.bad hand POSS-3f matter ‘. . . when her husband was infuriated by her behavior . . .’

The notion ‘territory’, i.e. the ‘place under the control of a ruler’ is also given in example (58). Here the conquest of a population group is expressed by the verb dia ‘take’ which is also used to take possession of an object (51), but in a completely different construction. Be ‘hand’ is not used as a preposition introducing a possessed item, but in the syntactic position of the direct object. This means that the conquerors do not metaphorically take the defeated people into their hands, but—applying a more clever strategy—they seize the hands of the defeated people. Therewith they get hold of their enemies’ most power­ful and effective tool of defence disabling them from resistance or counter-attack. (58) . . . ko ki ta dia be a-giyore 3m SEQ yet take hand PL-these.here ‘. . . and when he had overcome them [i.e. the Abarambo]’

Figure 1 shows the grammaticalization processes of be becoming first a preposition marking possession, and then a marker of the non-animate cause as an effect or the animate source of danger. noun

preposition

taking/holding possession Figure 1

possession of objects

possession of territory/power

Polygrammaticalization of be ‘hand’

place/possession of a powerful/dangerous owner inanimate cause of unpleasant effect

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embodiment in zande

6

Numerals, Counting, Specification/Emphasizing

Ever since Müller’s (1889: 5) early sketches of some Central Africa languages, European linguists have known that Zande, like a number of other languages, uses body part terms for counting. The best known example is boro ‘body, flesh’ which is also used as a denota­tion for ‘20’. It may be pluralized, but more often than not, it is used in the singular when referring to multiples of 20: boro sa (person one) ‘20’, boro ue (person two) ‘40’, a-boro biata na bisue (PL-person three and five) ‘65’. Bawe ‘10’ looks like a lexicalization of be ue ‘two hands’, an observation already made by Müller (1889: 5). Müller also assumes that bisue ‘5’ is composed of be ‘hand’ and the numeral sa ‘one’ (*bi sa ‘one hand’). However, boro is not only used as a number word, but may also determine new constituents (59) or emphasize the following noun (59), adverb (60) or adjective (61). (59) Rago ki ta gira kina boro ngbawiso place SEQ yet shine just person morning ‘Very early next morning [Gbudwe came into court].’ (60) Wawa Ture ni-ye kina boro ari cry T. X-go just person up ‘Ture’s cries went up’, i.e. they were really loud (61) ako gu gbia re, boro EXCL DEF.D chief DEM person ‘Oh, that prince, a real fierce prince is he!’

yo there

kere terrible

gbia chief

du be

a! ?

The term for ‘head’, ri, may be used when counting units of non single items, but there are only few examples which indicate that it is a rare construc­tion. The increasing use of French in DR Congo and CAR to count goods and money in the market makes the Zande numerals more and more obsolete. (62) ri kpwakaya sa/biyata head sandal one/three ‘one/three pairs of leather sandals’

218 7

Pasch

Geometry and Architecture

Not many human body parts play a role in the descriptions of geometrical shapes. Apparently, only vuru ‘belly’ may be used to denote geometrical shapes of two or three dimensions. In a compound, the first component of which is pa ‘side’ (likewise a body part), it is used in order to describe a rectangular house (63). However, the same type of house may also be described by referring to its four corners (64). It must be kept in mind that these circumscriptions apply to two-dimensional rectangular shapes as well as to three-dimensional cuboids. (63) pa-vuru-he biama side-belly-INAN.2 four ‘its sides [are] four’ (L&V 131) (64) si na tukpwu INAN.1 with outside.corner ‘it has four corners’

Photo 1

biama four

A house of the type ngongo mbara (in Bangassou)

embodiment in zande

219

Animal body parts of play a minor role for terms expressing spatial relations, but the body of at least one animal, the elephant, serves as an allegory for the architectural shapes of two types of shelter. The first is the common rectangular house, often called bambo mbara (house elephant) ‘house [of the type] elephant’. The four legs of the elephant supposedly constitute the four outside corners. The second is a type of grass-thatched half-open shelter referred as bambo ngongo mbara (house back elephant) ‘house of the type “elephant’s back” ’ (see Fig. 1). The slant at the far end somehow calls to mind an elephant’s backside. 8 Conclusion A number of body part terms of Zande have a wide range of meta­phorical meanings. Most of these are purely lexical, only a few result from grammaticalization. Specific subsets of usages are linked to restricted sets of body part terms. Specific types of usages are carried out by restricted sets of bodypart terms. Purely lexical metaphors of the denotations for ‘heart’, ‘head’ and ‘eye’, are used for the expression of emotions, the term for ‘eye’ being by far the most frequent. Compounds of the terms for ‘side’ and ‘belly’ plus a numeral indicate the number of sides or corners of rectangles and cuboids. Animal bodies or their body parts are found in two compounds used as allegoric designations for certain architectural shapes. Some of the uses of the term for ‘hand’, be are quite exceptional among the languages of the world. While it is not uncommon to express possession of an item as holding it in the hand, the term be has acquired additional specific functions in Zande by further grammaticalization. The first one is that of marking origin from a powerful, often dangerous animate source, and the second is the marking of the (usually negative) effect of an action or from an inanimate object. The use of body part terms to denote the five spatial concepts of Heine’s scale is also important. Eight body part terms are used with this function, next to five terms that have landmarks as their conceptual sources. This means that each landmark based term is used for only one specific concept, and—in addition—all concepts, with the exception of down, are expressed by several body part terms, of which bangiri ‘eye’ can even express three concepts. Four body part terms are extremely frequent: bangiri, ‘eye’ having the widest range of spatial notions (‘in the middle’, ‘in front’, ‘on top’), ri ‘head’ gi ‘back’ and sa

220

Pasch

Figure 2

‘tail’. Another four are less frequent: rumburu ‘buttocks’, ngba ‘mouth’, ngbadu ‘in’ and vuru ‘in’. Figure 2 shows the distribution of highly frequent and not frequent terms with respect to the different spatial concepts. The former are represented in large-size bold letters, the latter in small-size narrow letters. Body part terms are written in italics, landmark terms in roman. Figure 2 shows that all of the five basic spatial concepts listed by Heine (1997: 46) can be expressed by means of body part terms, but all of them can also be expressed by landmark terms. Apart from down, at the left end of the scale, all concepts can be expressed by several body part terms, whereas the landmark terms cover only one concept each. With regard to Zande the order of the concepts on Heine’s scale has to be modified as follows: down < front < in < up < back. There is no one concept marking a boundary between body part based concepts and landmark based concepts. It is rather a scale showing increasing import­ance of bodypart terms from left to right and increasing importance of landmark terms from right to left. up and in are the concepts where the two types have similar importance.

embodiment in zande

221

Abbreviations AN animate, but non-human gender ADJ adjective ANAPH anaphoric pronoun COP copula DEF(.P/D) proximal/distal definite marker DIR direction marker EXCLAM exclamation INAN inanimate gender LOG logophoric pronoun NUM number word PL plural POSS possessive QUANT quantifier RED reduplication REFL reflexive REV reverential request SEQ sequential SUB subordinator SUFF suffix of the citation forms of bodypart terms 1s, 2s, 3s 1st, 2nd, 3rd person singular pronoun 1p, 2p, 3p 1st, 2nd, 3rd plural pronoun .1/.2 pronouns of the first/second series 3m/3f 3rd masculine/3rd feminine pronoun II/III/X TAM markers according to Boyd 1995 Acknowledgements This paper has emerged from a research project on Zande grammar. I gratefully acknowledge the sponsoring of the project by the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft). Previous versions of this paper were read by (in alphabetical order) Anne-Maria Fehn, Angelika Jakobi, Angelika Mietzner, Doris Richter gen. Kemmermann, and Anne Storch. I am grateful for their valuable comments. All remaining weaknesses of this paper are, however, my re­sponsibility. I owe thanks to David Roberts for polishing my English, Monika Feinen for the design of Figure 1 and to Gervais Zanga for taking the photo. Landi Germain, mother tongue speaker of Zande from Central African Republic, and my language consultant throughout the project, merits

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Pasch

special thanks for his untiring online help (when I was writing this paper) to solve problems related to the meaning of certain constructions. .

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Lakoff, George and Mark Johnson 1980. Metaphors We Live By. University of Chicago Press. Müller, Friedrich 1889. ‘Die äquatoriale Sprachfamilie in Central-Afrika.’ In: Sitzungsberichte der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Bd. CXIX, pp. 1–16. Wien: Tempsky. Owens, Jonathan 1985. A Grammar of Harar Oromo (Northeastern Ethiopia). Hamburg: Buske. O’Dowd, E. (1992): ‘The syntactic metaphor of subordination: A typological study.’ Lingua 86, 1: 47–80. Pasch, Helma 2007. ‘Grammar of location and motion in Zande.’ In: Mietzner, A. & Y. Treis (eds.) Encoding Motion. Case Studies from Africa. Annual Papers in African Linguistics 5: 165–181. ——— 2011. ‘Zande Attributes and Pronoun Copying.’ In: Anne Storch, Gratien G. Atindogbé, Roger M. Blench (eds.) Copy Pronouns. Case Studies from African Languages (Kay Williamson Educational Foundation, vol. 3.), pp. 213–236. Cologne: Köppe. ——— 2012a. ‘From anaphoric pronoun to copula in Zande.’ In: Brenzin­ger Matthias and Anne-Maria Fehn (eds.) Proceedings, 6th World Congress of African Linguistics, Cologne 2009. Cologne: Köppe. ——— 2012b. ‘Two multifunctional locative and directional prepositions in Zande.’ In: Mietzner, Angelika and Ulrike Claudi (eds.) Expressions of Directioality in African Languages. Cologne: Köppe. ——— 2013. ‘Number and numerals in Zande. In: Anne Storch and Gerrit J. Dimmendaal (eds.), Number—Constructions and Semantics. (Studies in Language Companion Series 110), pp. 309–328. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: Benjamins. ——— 2014. ‘Zahlwörter, Allquantor und Demonstrativum in nomenferner Position.’ Afrikanistik-Aepgytologie-online, http://www.afrikanistik-aegyptologie-online.de/ archiv/2014/3765 (02.05.2014). Helma Pasch and François Mbolifouye 2011. ‘I am subordinate to Gbudwe, but your Sovereign. Using a subject pronoun in object position in order to claim power.’ Afrikanistik online, http://www.afrikanistik-online.de/archiv/2011/2907. Svorou, Soteria 1994. The Grammar of Space. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Talmy, Leonhard 1985. ‘Lexicalization patterns: Semantic structure in lexical forms.’ In: Shopen, T. (ed.) Language Typology and Syntactic Description III: Grammatical Categories and the Lexicon, pp. 57–149 Cambridge: CUP. Tucker, A.N. 1959. Le groupe linguistique Zande. Tervuren: MRCB. Wierzbicka, Anna 1992. Semantics, Culture, and Cognition. Oxford: OUP. ——— 1999. Emotions across Languages and Cultures: Diversity and Universals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Yu, Ning 2002. ‘Body and emotion. Body parts in Chinese expressions of emotion.’ Pragmatics & Cognition 10, 1/2: 341–367.

Body Parts We Live By in Language and Culture: The raaS ‘head’ and yidd ‘hand’ in Tunisian Arabic1 Zouheir Maalej Abstract It is now widely documented across languages and cultures that body parts are used to conceptualize mental faculties, emotions, character traits, and cultural values. The languages studied and documented in these domains of knowledge cut across different families of languages and cultures such as Arabic, Basque, Chinese, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, German, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Persian, Spanish, Thaayorre, Turkish, etc. As a follow-up of work done on body parts in Tunisian Arabic (henceforth, TA), I argue that a motivated division of labor between the various parts of the body is active in many languages and cultures. Such a division, however, does not prevent overlap between some body parts in terms of what domain of knowledge they are culturally made to conceptualize. I also argue that internal body parts in general are more likely to be based on metaphor and get involved more in mental faculties and emotions and less with character traits and cultural values. However, external body parts are more likely to be based on metonymy and get involved more in character traits and cultural values and less with mental faculties and emotions. In the current chapter, the body parts, raaS (head) and yidd (hand), will be dealt with in TA to show part of such a division. Unlike the heart and the eye that have been shown to conceptualize mental faculties, emotions, character traits, and cultural values to different degrees, it will be argued that, owing to their salient place in the body and their saliency in some types of cultural experience, the raaS (head) and yidd (hand) in TA are mostly used to conceptualize character traits and cultural values.

Introduction The embodiment thesis is the backbone on which cognitive linguistics rests. More than allowing for the body to get into the mind, embodiment is impor1 The author is indebted to Iwona Kraska-Szlenk, the co-editor of this collection, for many useful comments that have improved this chapter. The author is also indebted to two reviewers for some pertinent comments on contents and language and style. Obviously, responsibility for the chapter is incumbent on the author.

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tantly part-and-parcel of a theory of human understanding—“indirect understanding via metaphor” (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980: 178). The embodiment thesis is motivated by pre-linguistic image-schematic structures arising from personal and socio-cultural embodied experiences, held to have “a figurative character, as structures of embodied imagination” (Johnson, 1987: xx). Thus, “the centrality of human embodiment directly influences what and how things can be meaningful for us, the ways in which these meanings can be developed and articulated, the ways we are able to comprehend and reason about experience, and the actions we take” (Johnson, 1987: xiv). This has a consequence for the mind, which is “not merely embodied, but embodied in such a way that our conceptual systems draw largely upon the commonalities of our bodies and of the environments we live in. The result is that much of a person’s conceptual system is either universal or widespread across languages and cultures” (Lakoff & Johnson, 1999: 6). Embodiment via body parts has started to gain momentum in cognitive linguistic studies thanks largely to two full-length edited volumes (Sharifian et al., 2008; Maalej & Yu, 2011). The two publications investigate the conceptualizing role of internal and outer body parts respectively, concluding that they target knowledge domains such as mental faculties, emotions, character traits, and cultural values (Aksan, 2011; Foolen, 2008; Gaby, 2008; Geeraerts & Gevaert, 2008; Goddard, 2008; Ibarretxe-Antuñano, 2008; Ikegami, 2008; Maalej, 2008, 2011; Marmaridou, 2011; Nagai and Hiraga, 2011; Niemeier, 2008; Nissen, 2011; Occhi, 2008, 2011; Sharifian, 2008, 2011; Siahaan, 2008, 2011; Vainik, 2011; Yoon, 2008; Yu, 2002, 2004, 2008a–b–c, 2009, 2011). Most of these researchers studied the body parts of heart, eye, liver, and stomach in their respective languages. Very few, however, focused on the head (Aksan, 2011; Siahaan, 2011), and no study was devoted to the hand in these two volumes. In English, the head is used in expressions such as the following, most of which do not make sense to speakers of Tunisian Arabic (TA) but are intelligible to them as will be shown through expressions using raaS ‘head’ in TA: head to head = in a race, when two contestants are doing as well as each other: “They are head to head in the polls.” off the top of your head = when you give an answer to something without having the time to reflect: “What’s our market strategy?” “Well, off the top of my head, I can suggest . . .” have a good head for = be good at something: “He’s an accountant and he has a good head for figures.” have your head in the clouds = dream: “He’s always got his head in the clouds—he makes all these impossible plans.”

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go over your head = not understand something: “The lesson went over my head—I didn’t understand a word of it.” keep your head = stay calm: “He always keeps his head in a crisis.” be head over heels in love = be completely in love: “You can see that he’s head over heels in love with her.” keep your head above water = manage to survive financially: “Despite the recession, they kept their heads above water.” use your head = think about something to solve a problem: “It’s quite simple—just use your head!”2 In English, the same can be said of the word hand such as in the following expressions, most of which do not make sense to speakers of Arabic but are intelligible to them as will be shown through expressions using yidd ‘hand’ in TA: On hand available for use. “My mum always has lots of food on hand” In hand in your possession or control. “He has the situation well in hand” Out of hand very quickly without serious thought. “He decided to go to Italy out of hand” Out of hand (2) not controlled.  “Her children were tired and quickly got out of hand, running everywhere” At hand close in distance or time. “She always keeps her phone close at hand” At first hand in a direct way “I was able to verify his statement at first hand” Eat out of someone’s hand to be completely controlled by someone. “Her boyfriend has her eating out of his hand” Offhand without premeditation or preparation. “I can’t give you my telephone number offhand, I’ve forgotten it” By hand with the hands. “Jane makes earrings by hand” Second hand having had a previous owner. “I love my handbag, even though it’s second hand” Get/Lay your hands on to find, get, or control (someone or something).  “I finally managed to lay my hands on some of that chocolate cake” 2 http://www.english-at-home.com/idioms/head-idioms/.

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Hand in glove very closely.  “James and Sue are working hand in glove to make the project work” On the one hand,on the other hand used to introduce statements that describe two different or opposite ideas, people, etc.  “On the one hand, it’s really cheap, but on the other I can’t afford it”3 Wash your hands of something: To wash your hands of a problem or situation means that you refuse to deal with it any longer. With a heavy hand: Dealing with or treating people with a heavy hand means acting with discipline and severity, with little or no sensitivity. “He ran the juvenile delinquent centre with a heavy hand.” Have your hands full: If you have your hands full, you are very busy or you have a lot to do.4 For instance, both “heavy hand” and “hands full” also exist in TA, but they do not at all mean the same thing as in English. The former profiles slow performance while the latter profiles wealth. The current chapter is structured as follows. The first section deals with the head and its correlative functions as mental faculty, character traits, and cultural values. The second section addresses the correlative functions of hand in TA as character traits (including those in proverbs). The third and last section is devoted to a discussion of both body parts in terms of their cognitive and functional roles in Tunisian culture. 1

The Head in TA

In the literature, studies of head across languages abound. Niemeier (2008: 359–60) classifies the conceptualizations of head in English into three major conceptual metaphors, namely, head as LOCUS OF REASONING, head as CONTROL CENTRE, and head as CONTAINER. Siahaan (2011: 96–103) has found head in German and Indonesian to profile the same conceptual metaphors of head as LOCUS OF THOUGHT, head as CONTAINER, and head as the correlate of HUMAN CHARACTER TRAITS. However, she was able to show that German speakers have a preference for the function of kopf ‘head’ 3 http://www.abaenglish.com/blog/english-vocabulary-learn-english-with-aba/idioms-andexpressions/expressions-with-the-word-hand/ (accessed on 23/1/2012). 4 http://www.learn-english-today.com/idioms/idiom-categories/hands.htm (accessed on 23/1/ 2012).

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while Indonesian speakers have a preference for the position of kepala ‘head’ (Maalej & Yu, 2011: 11). Aksan (2011: 247–48), on the other hand, argues that in Turkish başi ‘head’ is profiled as head as HIGH STATUS, head as a RULER, and head as TALENT. The word raaS (‘head’) in TA5 is used as a source domain for many conventional expressions such as raaS bSall (onion head), raaS θum (garlic head), raaS lift (turnip head), raaS bruklu (cauliflower head), raaS krum (cabbage head), raaS xass (lettuce head), raaS bisbes (anise head), raaS ilmissaak (head of the pin), etc. It should be noted that these expressions designate vegetables which are roughly thought to resemble the human head in shape but not in size or function. The human head also profiles many other different target domains for various motivations such as raaS innahj (head of the street) for the beginning of the street from the speaker’s perspective, raaS ilfitla (head of the thread) for the part that guides us to the ball of thread, raaS ilmaal (head of the capital) for money capital, etc. I prefer to see raaS ‘head’ in TA as an ensemble of metaphors and metonymies which constitute a higher level of cognitive representation known as a “cultural model” of raaS ‘head.’ What a cultural model affords over disparate and sometimes conflicting conceptual metaphors is “a more dominant conceptual frame” containing “various sub-models that complement each other as different facets of the more overarching cultural model” (Niemeier, 2008: 350). This ties in with what Lakoff and Johnson (1980) say about different conceptual metaphors serving the same concept without these alternatives being contradictory. Thus, the cultural model of raaS ‘head’ in TA profiles it as concerned with the mental faculty of thinking, some character traits, some cultural values, and as used in many metonymic expressions where the head stands for the person, as will be demonstrated in the following sub-sections. 1.1 Mental Faculty In many cultures, the heart is associated with emotions while the head is associated with reason. Reason is seen to reside in the head since the latter includes the brain. Thus, the head is a PART-WHOLE metonym for reason, whereby it functions as the LOCUS OF REASONING as in the following example:

5 Throughout this paper the TA examples are transcribed according to the following conventions: capital letters T, D, S, for emphatic (pharyngealized) Tˤ, ðˤ, Sˤ, respectively, ʻ for ʕ, H for ħ, R for ɣ, š for ʃ and ž for ʒ; otherwise IPA symbols are used. Vowel length is indicated by vowel doubling.

the raas ‘ head ’ and yidd ‘ hand ’ in tunisian arabic

(1)

ʻamill illi qal-l-u [he] do-PERF that tell-PERF to him ‘He did what his head told him.’ He acted without seeking advice.

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raaS-u head his

The linguistic metaphor in (1) is reproachful of the mental behavior of the actor but in general “to do what your head told you” in TA presupposes, depending on the context, either that you acted reasonably or unreasonably. A reasonable head is laudable while an unreasonable one is not. If it turns out that a person is unable to make the right judgment or reasoning about a given state of affairs, it is thought in TA that his head needs repairing, as is suggested in the following example: (2)

qaʻʻad-l-u raaS-u [you] repair to him head his ‘Repair his head.’ Can you reason him?

As is presupposed from the linguistic metaphor in (2), because the head is not functioning properly, it needs to be repaired, i.e. the person possessing the head needs reasoning with. The conceptual metaphor governing (2) is THE HEAD IS A MACHINE. Apart from being the LOCUS OF REASONING and A MACHINE, the cultural model of raaS is still not complete without the existence of some coherence. If the head is the locus of reason and a machine, it should logically need to be filled with contents in order for the machine to find fodder to act upon. When someone cannot make sense of a given state of affairs, the state is conceptualized as being denied access to the head or resisting acceptance within the head as in the following example: (3)

l-iHkaja ma daxlitš the story no enter-PERF not ‘The story did not get into my head.’ The story did not make sense to me.

l-raaS-i to head my

As a metonymic metaphor, the head is conceptualized as a container which only reasonable states of affairs can get into, as is clear from the verb daxlitš

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(did not enter). As the seat of the mental faculty, the head can give and deny access to what it finds (in)compatible with reason. If access is permitted, it means that a state of affairs is judged as reasonable, and can now reside in the container. If access is denied, it means that a state of affairs is rejected as unreasonable. In this sense, THE HEAD IS A CONTAINER FOR REASON. The head in TA occurs in some proverbial expressions as a container for knowledge and intelligence as in the following expressions: (4)

xuð il-ʻilm min ruS il-fkaarin [you] take-IMPERF the knowledge from heads the turtles ‘Take knowledge from turtles’ heads.’ Knowledge is not to be taken from simple-minded people.

This is an ironical proverb, which discourages people from obtaining knowledge from those who have little or none of it, and exhorts them to acquire it from knowledgeable people. What suggests that THE HEAD IS A CONTAINER FOR KNOWLEDGE is the preposition min (from). Another conceptual metaphor pertaining to the head as a container is found in (5) below: (5)

ir-raaS illi ma fi-ih zur baSla xair min-nu the head that no in it cunningness onion better from it ‘A head without cunningness is no better than an onion.’ There is no better head than a smart one.

Smartness or intelligence is assumed to be the contents of the head, which suggests the conceptual metaphor of THE HEAD IS A CONTAINER FOR INTELLIGENCE. There is coherence between head as a CONTAINER FOR KNOWLEDGE and head as a CONTAINER FOR INTELLIGENCE. Intelligence acts on this knowledge to make it worthwhile. For this reason, the two conceptual metaphors could be lumped together as THE HEAD IS A CONTAINER FOR KNOWLEDGE AND INTELLIGENCE. Since the head does not make maximal use of thought or reasoning, it can be manipulated by the others as in the following examples: (6)

dawwar-it-l-u raaS-u [she] turn-PERF-FEM to him head his ‘She turned his head.’ She made him change his mind.

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TaiHit-tu ʻala raaS-u [she] fall-PERF him on head his ‘She made him fall on his head.’ She seduced him.

The linguistic metaphor in (6) above is coherent with THE HEAD IS A MACHINE, whereby the head has been manipulated in order to make it function (un) reasonably. Dawwar (to turn) presupposes here a button on a machine, which is turned on and off. In (7), however, love is conceptualized as falling on the head, which entails that since the head is now not in its uppermost position on the axis of VERTICALITY of the body, it cannot perform its normal functions of thinking and reasoning. 1.2. Character Traits Beside its important role as a mental faculty, the head in TA is also used in conceptualizing the character trait of stubbornness as in the following examples: (8)

raaS-u kbiir head his big ‘His head is big.’ He is stubborn.

This conceptualization of stubbornness capitalizes on size, which makes the head bigger than its normal size in non-stubborn individuals. Thus, TA manipulates the size of the head by making it bigger than normal to conceptualize stubbornness, which roughly can be captured as BEING STUBBORN IS HAVING A MANIPULABLE HEAD. Stubbornness is also conceptualized in a way that is conflictive with (8) above. For instance, in (9) below the head is thought to be rather physically inflexible since it shows a certain hardness, which is indicative of resistance to persuasion: (9)

raaS-u SHiiH Head his hard ‘His head is hard.’ He is stubborn.

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Tunisians expect their fellow citizens to show some degree of flexibility, with stubbornness being conceptualized as BEING STUBBORN IS HAVING AN INFLEXIBLE HEAD. A variant of (9) can be found in (10) and (11) below, which actually relate to it by entailment, i.e. if something is hard, it is not easily breakable or it does not break at all: (10)

(11)

raaS-u ma jitkissarš head his no break-IMPERF not ‘His head does not break.’ He is stubborn. raaS-u ma jqiSS-u-š qaaDi faas head his no cut-IMPERF judge Fes ‘His head cannot be cut by the judge of Fes.’ He is so stubborn.

The difference between (10) and (11) is that the latter is stronger in meaning than the former. This difference comes from the fact that (10) capitalizes on the head’s breakability; should the head break, it will be reduced to pieces, which counts as persuasion to the head’s owner in TA. On the other hand, (11) capitalizes on the unlikelihood of the head to be beheaded, i.e. even if the head is cut off, the owner of it will not be persuaded. In other words, the hyperbolic dimension in (11) means to say that the person in question is very hard, if not impossible, to persuade. In (12) below, the fact that someone is unlikely to be persuaded as a result of their being stubborn is not because their head is “big” or “hard” but because it cannot retain reason owing to its metaphoric structure: (12)

raaS-u naašif head his dried up ‘His head is dried up.’ He is stubborn.

The head is conceptualized as having here a sponge-like texture. A sponge cannot retain much water owing to its porous structure, therefore drying up quickly because of its permeability. By analogy, a spongy head as in (12) cannot

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keep enough reason inside it to function properly, which causes it to dry up. Since the head is dried up, the person possessing it cannot be easily persuaded. In (13) below, someone is stubborn owing to their head’s structure. (13)

raaS-u mlaHHam head his meaty ‘His head is meaty.’ He is stubborn.

The knowledge that the head in animate beings includes more bones than flesh and a soft brain is important here. However, I do not in the least mean to imply that Tunisians are aware of the difference in texture between the brain and flesh in creating this conceptualization of stubbornness. Popularly, someone may be conceptualized as lahma fiha ruH (X is but flesh inside which there is a soul), which means that they are made of flesh or alive meat but without reason and emotions. Another important linguistic metaphor realizing the conceptual metaphor of BEING STUBBORN IS HAVING AN INFLEXIBLE HEAD is found in (14): (14)

raaS-u ma jidxilš head his no enter-IMPERF ‘A comb is unable to enter his head.’ He is stubborn.

fi-ih mišT in it comb

This metonymic metaphor profiles the head in a PART-WHOLE metonymic relation with hair as suggested by the lexical items jidxil (enter) mišT (a comb). Stubbornness is conceptualized as having entangled, impenetrable hair for the comb. 1.3 Cultural Values Together with the mental faculty and the character trait of stubbornness, the head in TA also profiles cultural values such as industriousness, hospitality and dishonor, as will be shown in the following. 1.3.1 Industriousness Industriousness in TA is conceptualized as an image metaphor, which depicts industrious people as drawing a full circle with their body, with their feet higher than their head as in (15) below:

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saakai-h aʻla min raaS-u feet his high-COMPARATIVE than head his ‘His feet were higher than his head.’ He was head over heels.

It is interesting to note that the image of industriousness in TA depicts the feet as reaching the head in a forward movement, with the head remaining in place as a result while in English the expression “head over heels” depicts the person as bending his head back to reach the heels in a backward movement as a result of the fact that it is the head that is over the heels. In English terms, in English the expression is “head over heels” while in TA it is “heels over head.” The conceptual metaphor that can be written for (15) is BEING INDUSTRIOUS IS HAVING ONE’S FEET OVER ONE’S HEAD. 1.3.2 Hospitality Hospitality in TA capitalizes on the UP-DOWN and VERTICALITY image schemas as in the following examples: (16)

(17)

(18)

illi hazz wild-i w baas-u HaTTn-i fuq raaS-u that raise-PERF son my and kiss-PERF him put-PERF me on head his ‘He who raised my son and kissed him raised me above his head.’ He who has loved my child has actually respected me. xalla-ni/hazz-ni [he] put-PERF me/lift-PERF me ‘He put/lifted me over his head.’ He was hospitable to me.

fuq over

raaS-u head his

ʻala raaS-i w ʻain-i On head my and eye my ‘On my head and my eyes.’ You are welcome.

All of the examples in (17–19) conceptualize hospitality as a vertical movement. In the proverb in (16) and the conventional metaphor in (17), hospitality capitalizes on the head as a space over which a guest is raised by a hospitable person. In (18), hospitality capitalizes on the head and the eyes. Thus, hospitality is conceptualized as BEING HOSPITABLE IS PUTTING PEOPLE OVER ONE’S

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HEAD AND EYES, which suggests that hospitality is motivated by the more primary conceptual metaphor UP IS GOOD. 1.3.3 Dishonor and Pride The UP-DOWN schema is capitalized upon in TA in the conceptualization of dishonor and pride, with the former as DOWN and the latter as UP as in the following examples: (19)

(a)

(b)

xalla-l-na raaS-i fi-t-traab [he] cause-PERF to us head my in the sand ‘He caused our head to be in the ground.’ He dishonored us. hazzil-na raaS-na [he] lift-PERF to us our head ‘He lifted our head for us.’ He made our pride.

Since the head is the uppermost part of the body, it overlaps with pride on the schema of VERTICALITY as in (19b) above. When the head leaves its uppermost position and lands in the position of the feet, which corresponds to the DOWN position on the VERTICALITY axis, dishonor is conceptualized. In (19a), “traab” (sand) is obviously under our feet, which is where dishonor locates the head in the case of TA. The conceptual metaphors here are BEING DISHONORED IS HAVING ONE’S HEAD DOWN and BEING PROUD IS HAVING ONE’S HEAD UP, which are governed by the more primary metaphors, DOWN IS BAD and UP IS GOOD. 1.4 Part-for-Whole So far, the head in TA has been investigated in metaphoric expressions. However, the head is also used in PART-WHOLE metonyms, where the head stands for the person, such as in ja raaSu ʻaliiha (came his head on her: He came to find fault with her), žaat fi raaSu (came in his head: He had to do it alone or he was accused of having done it), raaSi fi raaSu (my head in his head: We were just the two of us), jiDrab raaS braaS (he beats a head with a head: He plots between two of them and keeps watching them), xallaawah braaSu fiddaar (They left him with his head at home: They left him alone at home), dazzha fi raaSi (he shoved it in my head: He did it and accused me of having done it), ndabbar raaSi (I meddle through my head: I can meddle through by myself), imma raaSi wa illa raaSu (either my head or his head: It is either me

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Mental faculties of reasoning and intelligence

Head for person metonym

Cultural model of the head in ta

cultural values of industriousness, hospitality, dishonor, and pride

Character trait of stubborness

Figure 1

The semantic domains of the cultural model of the head in ta

or him), and kabbšu fi ruS baʻDhim (They clutched in the heads of each other: They picked up a row). The cultural model of the head in TA can be summed up in the following figure: 2

The Hand in Tunisian Arabic

In TA, jidd (‘hand’) profiles several important target domains such as agricultural tools ( jidd ilmisHa: the hand of a spade; jidd ilbaala: the hand of the shovel; jidd ilmišT: the hand of the rake; jidd miHraaθ: the hand of a plow),

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kitchen utensils (jidd itTinžara: handle of the pan; jidd izzizwa: the handle of the coffee pot; jidd ilqiffa: the handle of the alfalfa basket), practical tools ( jidd ilbaab: the door handle; jidd ilmTarqa: the handle of the hammer), and the work force (ljidd lʻaamla). Another important use of yidd (‘hand’) in TA profiles the hand as a unit of measurement such as in jidd qamH (a handful of wheat), sometimes diminished to ywaida qamH (a hand not full of wheat), jidd dihn (a coat of paint), etc. Comparatively, studies of hand are not as thick as those on head across languages. For instance, Morrow (2009: 16) tells us that the hand lemma has a much higher frequency of occurrence than that of heart in the British National Corpus. He explains this higher frequency by “the fact that people are more conscious of what they do with their hands since at some level they are making decisions about how they will use their hands.” In TA, unlike the head which is used to conceptualize character traits and cultural values, the hand is overwhelmingly used for character traits. Obviously, the involvement of the hand in practical jobs makes it a better candidate for a lot of practical skills in which it is used. Another characteristic of the hand is that it is also used in many TA proverbs that highlight its practical dimension and nature for the workings of Tunisian culture. A further use of hand is as a PART-WHOLE metonym, where the hand stands for the person. 2.1 Character Traits Compared to the head, which is only involved in the character trait of stubbornness, the hand in TA is involved in many positive and negative character traits. 2.1.1 Dexterity and Awkwardness As associated with the hand, dexterity seems to be the character trait which finds locus in the hands, which are conceptualized as a container for manual work as in the following example: (20)

Sanʻit-ha fi jdii-ha Craft her in hand her ‘Her craft is in her hand.’ She has craft in her hands.

In this connection, THE HAND IS A CONTAINER FOR MANUAL SKILL. A related metaphoric expression, but one not governed by the same concept, has

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to do with the hands complying with the person since they possess that skill, as in the following example: (21)

jdai-ha mTaawʻit-ha hands her comply-IMPERF her ‘Her hands comply with her.’ She is dexterous.

It is interesting to note that this is not a person-for-hand metonymy, but almost a disconnection between the person and the hands. Being dexterous with the hands adds the hands to the person. Thus, when they are skilled, the hands join the person as if they were themselves another person. Apart from the container metaphor for hands, being dexterous in TA is conceptualized as having pretty hands as in the following example: (22)

jdai-ha smaaH hands her pretty ‘Her hands are pretty.’ She is dexterous.

According to (22), the conceptual metaphor governing it is BEING A DEXTEROUS PERSON IS HAVING PRETTY HANDS. What seems to motivate such a mapping between the prettiness of hands and being dexterous is the popular belief that beauty is the product and producer of perfection. On the other hand, a crooked hand is also associated with the opposite of dexterity, i.e. awkwardness in doing things with one’s hands as in the following examples: (23)

(24)

jdi-ih mʻawwžiin hands his crooked ‘His hands are crooked.’ He is awkward. jdi-ih muš xwaat hands his no sisters ‘His hands are not sisters.’ He is not dexterous.

the raas ‘ head ’ and yidd ‘ hand ’ in tunisian arabic

(25)

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jdi-ih jdiin miHraaθ hands his hands of plow ‘His hands are those of a plow.’ He has awkward hands.

Being awkward with one’s hands in (23) is conceptualized in terms of “crooked hands” in contradistinction with the hands in (21) and (22) above. Crooked hands are far from perfect, which makes them produce unskilled work. In (24), being awkward is conceptualized in kinship terms, whereby kinship between the two hands is denied. It is interesting that biologically and physiologically human hands are not identical in size, in manual capacity, and brain structures that command them. There are right-handed and left-handed people, even though the latter are fewer than the former in number across human societies, which means that the right hand is more active in the former than in the latter category. However, Tunisian culture assumes, as is clear in (24) above, that the two hands are identical (i.e. metaphorically, sisters) in order for them to be able to work in harmony and produce perfect movements. When their sisterhood is denied, they start to malfunction. As regards (25), the conceptualization of awkwardness capitalizes on agriculture, whereby the hands of humans are likened to those of a plow. People familiar with plows know that the hands of the plow are clumsy in the sense that it cannot perform precise work. To confirm this, Tunisians insist on having a negative connotation about the work of the plow as is clear in disapprovingly conceptualizing a hard worker in TA as a miHraaθ ‘plow;’ the plow can never draw a perfectly straight line in the ground. To unify all of (23–25) in one conceptual metaphor, awkwardness may be captured as BEING AWKWARD IS HAVING CLUMSY HANDS. 2.1.2 Wealth and Poverty Beside this basic correlation between hand and craft, the hand in TA is tightly correlated with wealth and poverty. There is a division of labor in Tunisian culture between the right and the left hands, whereby the right one is thought to be the receiving or earning hand while the left hand is thought to be the spending one. There is also an old belief in that if the right hand itches, earnings are expected and if the left hand itches spending is very likely.6 In either case, THE HAND IS A CONTAINER FOR WEALTH as in the following example: 6 On another note, it is common even nowadays with advances in science to see parents in Tunisia stop their left-handed children from using their left hand when eating and writing because the right hand is associated in the Tunisian sub-culture with purity and the left hand

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jidd-u hand his

maljaana full

‘His hand is full.’ He is a rich man.

As presupposed by the logic of containers, a container is closely tied to the FULL-EMPTY schema clearly shown in maljaana ‘full.’ Following the logic of the Tunisian culture, since (26) is about wealth, it is the right hand of a wealthy person that is full of money, which is why TA does not accept the plural jdain hands of jidd ‘hand’ to be used. However, the existence of money in the right hand (earning) does not preclude it from going into the left one (spending). Obviously, the poor have no money, which is conceptualized in TA in hand terms as in the following example: (27)

jidd-u faarRa hand his empty ‘His hand is empty.’ He is a poor person.

It is interesting to think again according to the same logic of this division of labor between hands in the Tunisian culture. The hand which is predicated of emptiness is the right hand. And since the right hand is empty, the left hand is logically empty because it does not receive anything from the right one in view of spending. This situation is spelled out more explicitly in (28) below: (28)

jidd farRa w-l-exra ma fi-iha šajj hand empty and the other no in it thing ‘One hand is empty and the other has nothing in it.’ He is broke.

To say that one hand was empty and the other had nothing in it amounts to saying that both hands are empty. The conceptual metaphor here is BEING POOR IS HAVING ONE’S HANDS EMPTY.

is seen as dirty. In many Arab sub-cultures, persons who use their left hand in handing others coffee, tea, or other things are regarded unfavorably.

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2.1.3 Productivity and Lack of Productivity The hand in TA is a very productive source domain for many target domains. So far, four important target domains have been investigated, namely, dexterity, awkwardness, wealth, and poverty. Here, the hand is profiled for productivity as in the following examples: (29)

(30)

jidd-ha xafifa hand his light ‘Her hand is light.’ She is a productive worker. jidd-ha raziina Hand her heavy ‘Her hand is heavy.’ She is a slow worker.

In (29), the lightness of the hand makes it a good candidate for speed. In (30), however, the heaviness of the hand makes it a good candidate for slowness of action, which yields the conceptual metaphor of BEING PRODUCTIVE/ UNPRODUCTIVE IS HAVING A QUICK/SLOW HAND. 2.1.4 Thieving The lightness of the hand is also capitalized upon to conceptualize theft. The similarity between the two resides in the fact that both productivity and theft require speed of action. The conceptual metaphor for theft in terms of hand is BEING A THIEF IS HAVING A LIGHT HAND as in the following example: (31)

jidd-u xafifa hand his light ‘His hand is light.’ He is a pickpocket.

It should be noted that (31) is similar linguistically to (29) above. However, conceptually (29) is BEING PRODUCTIVE IS HAVING A QUICK HAND while (31) is HAVING A LIGHT HAND IS BEING A THIEF. It is interesting to refer to an invocation of God by Tunisians in which they ask Him to make their hands heavier, i.e. in the opposite sense of (31) as a way of evading, among other things, theft and other misconducts. The invocation is in (32) below:

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jθaqqal jdii-na ʻala ma jaðii-na heavy-IMPERF hands our on what harm-IMPERF us ‘May God make our hands heavy for what may harm us.’ May God protect us from what may harm us.

Obviously, theft and other misconducts are seen as harming the individuals committing them. 2.1.5 Power and Authority As addressed in Maalej (2008) concerning the heart and earlier in this chapter in connection with the head, the manipulation of body parts in Tunisian culture is a very common practice when it comes to the conceptualization of character traits and cultural values. Indeed, the hand is manipulated in two ways in the conceptualization of power and lack of authority, as in the following examples: (33)

(34)

jidd-u Tawiila hand his long ‘His hand is long.’ He has a lot of power. jidd-u qaSiira hand his short ‘His hand is short.’ He has no power.

In (33), the hand is manipulated by lengthening it to obtain power and authority. This elongation logically makes the arm an extension of the hand while in (34) it is shortened to conceptualize lack of power, which yields the conceptual metaphor, BEING POWERFUL/POWERLESS IS HAVING THE SIZE OF ONE’S HAND MANIPULATED. In both cases, it seems that the hand and the arm are coextensive; in the case of (33), co-extensiveness profiles the hand and the arm as longer than normal while in the case of (34) co-extensiveness profiles the hand and the arm as shorter than normal. Manipulation is not the only way of acting upon the hand to conceptualize power in TA. The UP-DOWN schema is also used to create the conceptual metaphor of POWER IS UP as in the following linguistic metaphor:

the raas ‘ head ’ and yidd ‘ hand ’ in tunisian arabic

(35)

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jidd-u lfuqanijja Hand his the upper ‘His hand is the upper one.’ He has a lot of power.

The opposite of this conceptual metaphor is LACK OF POWER IS DOWN, which conceptualizes the situation of all the people whose hands are under or beneath the hand of the individual in (35) above. Still with manipulation, there is a sense in which powers are attributed to persons, whereby they can cause changes to things or events but the manipulation does not occur to the hand per se as in the following example: (36)

jidd-u tžammid hand his freeze-IMPERF ‘His hand can make water freeze.’ He has supernatural powers.

l-ma the water

As is clear in (36) above, this use is a superstitious one, having to do with the attribution of extraordinary powers to someone, which may not be true as is clear from the hyperbole of freezing water just by using the hand. Obviously, this superstition does not reflect a belief that that the person in (36) can actually freeze water, but refers to his infallible actions. The conceptual metaphor here is PERFORMING EXTRAORDINARY ACTIONS IS HAVING A HAND WITH EXTRAORDINARY POWERS. 2.1.6 Generosity and Meanness The productivity of the practice of manipulation is also found in the conceptualization of generosity in TA as in the following example: (37)

jidd-u miTluqa. Hand his stretched ‘His hand is stretched forward.’ He is generous.

The hand is conceptualized as miTluqa ‘stretched out,’ which is an unnatural physiological position to be in. This stretching of the hand as generosity

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correlates with social and financial outreach. To understand the motivation of stretching the hand as generosity, one may refer to the other position that flexes the hand at the elbow, which necessarily involves the arm with the hand. When the arm is flexed at the elbow, it automatically comes closer to the body, which does not count as generosity and solidarity. However, when it is stretched forward, the hand leaves the ego of the body toward the other. Thus, generosity can be captured in the following conceptual metaphor: BEING GENEROUS IS HAVING ONE’S HAND EXTENDED FORWARD. Apart from forward manipulation of the hand, generosity builds on THE HAND AS A CONTAINER FOR WEALTH shown previously to conceptualize the contents of the hand as generosity as in the following example: (38)

illi fi jidd-u muš liih What in hand his no to him ‘What is in his hand is not his own.’ He is very generous with his money.

Since (38) builds on THE HAND AS A CONTAINER FOR WEALTH as is clear from the preposition fi ‘in’, the linguistic metaphor conceptualizes the contents of the hand as not possessed by the generous person, which means that he/she gives that away to the poor. Notice again that the singular yidd ‘hand’ is used instead of the plural from (26) above across all the character traits. On the other hand, the hand is used to conceptualize meanness in a different way, whereby the hand assumes a metaphoric image such as a cupped, closed hand as suggested by the following linguistic metaphor: (39)

jidd-u ma tqaTTarš l-ma hand his no drip the water ‘Water does not drip from his hand.’ He is very mean.

A miser is conceptualized as having the fingers of his or her hand so tight together that water cannot leak in between them, which shows that his or her wealth is tightly kept for the self. To adopt the water metaphor here, the conceptual metaphor can be captured as BEING A MISER IS HAVING AN IMPERMEABLE HAND.

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2.1.7 Discouragement Being discouraged in TA can come from the self or from the others. For convenience, the former will be called self-discouragement and the latter external discouragement. Self-discouragement is conceptualized through fire, coldness, and pain metaphors as in the following linguistic metaphors: (40)

(41)

(42)

jidd-i Harqit-ni hand my burn-PERF me ‘My hand burnt me.’ I thought twice before buying it. jdajj-a hands my

birdit cold-PERF

My hands got cold. ‘I had no courage to do it.’ jid-di wijʻit-ni hand my hurt-PERF me ‘My hand hurt me.’ I thought twice before buying it.

In TA, when they are high, prices are talked about as laswaam naar (prices are fiery), which entails the burning effect. In (40), the hand is conceptualized as burning the speaker, which counts as discouragement to buy. The two metaphors seem to cohere, and motivate each other. If prices are fiery, they burn the buyers’ hands, and if they burn buyers’ hands, the buyers become discouraged and refrain from buying. The reason it is involved here is that the hand metonymically does the paying or spending in all financial transactions: money, credit card, check, money draft, etc. Getting discouraged is not confined to financial scenarios. One may get discouraged in anything and by anything which requires action or involvement. In (41) above, discouragement takes place by causing the hand to get cold or colder. It seems that enthusiasm for doing something has its correlate in the nervous system, in particular in the system known as the sympathetic nervous system, which “activates what is often termed the fight or flight response . . . Postganglionic neurons principally release noradrenaline (norepinephrine). Prolonged activation can elicit the release of adrenaline from the adrenal medulla. Once released, noradrenaline and adrenaline bind adrenergic receptors on peripheral tissues.” The effect of noradrenaline and adrenaline includes

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“pupil dilation, increased sweating, increased heart rate, and increased blood pressure.”7 The opposite of enthusiasm or discouragement is not immune to what is known as the parasympathetic nervous system, which is “sometimes called the rest and digest system.” The parasympathetic system “conserves energy as it slows the heart rate, increases intestinal and gland activity, and relaxes sphincter muscles in the gastrointestinal tract.”8 Thus, it seems that coldness in the body as a result of reduced activity in the body is by extension transmitted metaphorically to the hand even though coldness is not a physiologically real thing in connection with a lack of enthusiasm for doing something. However, it is not suggested that Tunisians are fully aware of this scientific knowledge regarding this character trait. Owing to the fact that coldness in the hand has been there in the language and culture for a long time because it has a strong experiential grounding in all cultures, I would like to consider this mapping between coldness in the hand and lack of enthusiasm as culture-specific in the same way a cold person is mapped onto lack of emotion and affection in English. An approximate conceptual metaphor for (40) and (41) is BEING DISCOURAGED IS WHEN ONE’S HAND UNDERGOES A CHANGE IN TEMPERATURE. As to (42), it builds on pain to conceptualize discouragement. Obviously, the pain here is more mental than physical. It is mentally painful to have to pay for something and not get one’s money’s worth. The conceptual metaphor that best captures (42) is BEING DISCOURAGED IS FEELING PAIN IN THE HAND. External discouragement, however, is caused by external forces or factors as in the following linguistic metaphors: (43)

(44)

Darb-u ʻala jdii-h [he] beat-PERF on hands his. ‘He beat him on his hands.’ He has little freedom to act. kattif-l-u jdii-h [he] tie-PERF to him hands his ‘He tied up his hands for him.’ He has his hands tied.

7 http://www.sciencedaily.com/chapters/s/sympathetic_nervous_system.htm (accessed on January 26, 2012). 8 http://www.sciencedaily.com/chapters/p/parasympathetic_nervous_system.htm (accessed on January 26, 2012).

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The conceptual metaphor that governs (43) is the same as the one governing (42), i.e. BEING DISCOURAGED IS FEELING PAIN IN THE HAND as a result of beating while (44) is governed by BEING DISCOURAGED IS LOSING CONTROL OVER ONES’S HANDS. 2.1.8 Failure and Loss It seems that the two recurrent domains that dominate character traits in TA are hand as a container and manipulation of the hand. Failure and loss are partly conceptualized in terms of a container as in the following linguistic metaphors: (45)

(46)

šbiik ržaʻt jdai-k faarRin Why return-PERF hands your empty ‘Why did you return with your hands empty?’ Why did you return empty-handed? rjaʻʻ bi ydii-h [he] return-PERF with hands his ‘He returned with his hands in his hands.’ He returned with nothing in his hands.

fi ydii-h in hands his.

In (45), faarRin ‘empty’ presupposes that THE HAND IS A CONTAINER while (46) states that the contents of the container is the hand itself, which means that they are empty like in (45). Thus, building on the container image schema, (45) and (46) profile failure and loss as BEING A FAILURE OR LOSER IS BEING EMPTY-HANDED. 2.1.9 Control and Loss of Control Again, THE HAND AS A CONTAINER is an important conceptual metaphor for the conceptualization of character traits in TA. However, what sometimes makes the difference between the different traits is the contents of the hand as in the following examples: (47)

flaan fi jidd-i X in hand my ‘X is in my hand.’ X is under my control.

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In (47), control over somebody is conceptualized as having that person as the contents of the container, i.e. the hand, which suggests the conceptual metaphor of BEING CONTROLLED IS BEING CONTAINED IN THE HAND. However, loss of control over somebody can occur in two ways: the controlled leaving the container and the controller getting rid of the controlled as is shown in the following examples: (48)

(49)

flaan xraž min X leave-PERF from ‘X left my hand.’ X is not under my control.

jid-di hand my

flaan nfadht min-nu X shake-PERF from him ‘I shook my hand off him.’ X is not anymore under my control.

jid-di hand my

In (48), the controlled person is liberated by deliberately leaving the hands of the controller while in (49) the controller gets rid of the controlled person by not providing them with the opportunity to be contained in the controller’s hand. The conceptual metaphor for (48) and (49) is LOSS OF CONTROL IS NOT TO BE CONTAINED IN THE HAND. 2.1.10 Involvement and Solidarity There is an old saying in Arabic—jadu Allahi maʻa lžamaʻa (God’s hand is with the group)—which encourages group work and collaboration between individuals. Such a principle is exemplified by a lot of hand expressions in TA, which have to do with involvement in and solidarity with the other members of the group. Such expressions include jwiida jwiida (hand-DIM9 hand-DIM, which is an invitation to people to give a hand in a given activity), jiddi jiddik (my hand, your hand: which is an invitation to equally participate in an activity), jiddu fil ʻažna (his hand in the dough: to have a hand in something), jwaida lillaah (a hand to God: an invitation to contribute to an activity for free), ma HaTTiš fiha jiddu (he did not put his hand in it: he did not give a hand), madd jiddu lil Hinna (he lent his hand to henna:10 he was ready to contribute to 9 10

DIM stands for “diminutive.” Henna (Lawsonia inermis, also called henna tree) is a flowering plant used since antiquity to dye skin, hair, fingernails, leather and wool (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henna). In

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something), HaTTu ljidd fil jidd (they put the hand in the hand: they are hand in glove with each other), and jdiih aʻla min raaSu (his hands are higher than his head: he was much involved in an activity). The conceptual metaphor that roughly captures most of these linguistic metaphors is BEING INVOLVED AND SOLIDARY IS MAKING USE OF ONE’S HANDS. 2.2 Hand in Proverbs11 Maalej (2009: 136) considered proverbs as “a cultural wealth summing up the way of life and thought of a given culture.” The following proverbs reveal various things about the Tunisian culture. (50)

(51)

(52)

jifna maal il-židdain wi jibqa ʻamal il-lidain perish-IMPERF money of the grandfathers and remain-IMPERF work of the hands

‘Inherited wealth perishes and only the skill of the hand remains.’

bfumm-i nibni qSarr wi b-jid-di nibn-i Taabuna12 with mouth my [I] build-IMPERF castle and with hand my [I] build-IMPERF bread oven ‘I can build a castle by talking and with my hand I build a bread oven.’ ʻaSfur fi-l jidd wla ʻašra Bird in the hand rather than ten ‘A bird in the hand instead of ten on the roof.’

fis-StaHH in the roof

The proverb in (50) praises manual work that is the result of manual skill over money because the former is thought to remain while the latter may disappear, while in (51) building a traditional bread oven with the hand is preferred over talking about building a castle. On the other hand, (52) talks about practical sense where something in the hand is preferred over something which is not, i.e. something which you possess is better than something that you wish to possess. Tunisia, henna is used by women as a decoration of their hands and feet mainly for weddings. 11 The entries for these proverbs include three lines only because no English gloss has been attempted for them. 12 A tabouna in the Tunisian culture is a traditional one-yard high clay oven, with a narrower open top, a wider bottom, and openings on the side to let air in, fixed to the ground and heated to serve as an oven to make a special kind of thin bread known as “tabouna bread” by sticking it to the side of the oven.

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According to Lakoff and Turner (1989: 162), proverbs are governed by the conceptual metaphor of GENERIC IS SPECIFIC, where the GENERIC level of the mapping is the text of the proverb and the SPECIFIC level is the state of affairs in the world profiled by the proverb. (53)

(54)

(55)

(56)

(57)

(58)

(59)

(60)

taʻTii-h Sbuʻʻ yHibb l-jidd b-kullha [you] give-IMPERF him finger [he] like-IMPERF the hand by all ‘He was given a finger, but he wanted all the hand.’ illi žbidd Sbuʻʻ žbidd who pull-PERF finger pull-PERF ‘He who pulled a finger pulled all the hand.’

l-jidd the hand

b-kullha by all

qaSSu-l-u jid-du žaat mwaatijja lit-Tambur [they] cut to him hand his come-PERF suitable to the drum ‘They cut off his hand, and it came handy for the drum.’ ʻaTawa-h balHa madd jid-du lil-ʻaržun [they] give-PERF an unripe date [he] extend-PERF hand his to the bunch ‘He was given an unripe date, but he extended his hand to the whole bunch of dates.’ Sbaaʻ jid-dik muš mistwijja Fingers hand your not even ‘The fingers of your hand are not even.’ šad-du min yid-du illi tužʻ-u [he] take-PERF him from hand his that hurt-IMPERF him ‘He was held from his aching hand.’ šwajja mil-Hinna w šwajja min raTabit l-jidiin a little from henna and a little from softness the hands ‘Some is due to the henna, some to the softness of the hands.’ illi tiDrab-u jid-du ma tužʻuš that [it] beat-IMPERF him hand his no hurt-IMPERF not ‘One who is beaten by one’s own hand does not suffer.’

In all of the proverbs above, the GENERIC is the hand and the SPECIFIC is states of affairs that the GENERIC can be applied to. For instance, (53) applies to all scenarios of giving mixed with greed to have more, which is denounced by

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the proverb. In (54), there are two GENERIC domains, namely the finger and the hand. The proverb may apply to scenarios where two related topics may raise each other as in kinship relations; if you talk evil of the son, you are doing it to the father. The proverb in (55) is applied to situations where one mishap can serve a good purpose. The proverb in (56) applies to scenarios where someone is given something but gets greedy by wanting more, which is very similar to (53). In (57), situations where false analogy and overgeneralization prevail are denounced. The proverb in (58) deals with scenarios where one is talked to about a sensitive issue. In (59), blame is attributed to more than one responsible factor. And proverb (60) applies to situations or scenarios where reproach and blame come from a close person, which does not really hurt and harm the blamed person. In parallel to the metaphors discussed on character traits, the following proverbs develop the same traits: (61)

(62)

jidd waHda ma tSaffaqš hand single no clap-FEM-IMPERF ‘A single hand cannot clap.’ jiqriS w-jid-du [he] pinch-IMPERF and hand his ‘He pinches with his hand underneath.’

taHt-u under him

In (61), the sense of collaboration is reinforced as in involvement and solidarity metaphors above while (62) develops the character trait of covert evil behavior of plotting, which only exists in proverbial form. 2.3 Hand-for-Person Metonyms Like with head, the hand in TA is also used in a PART-WHOLE metonym of handfor-person as in the following examples: (63)

(64)

jdi-ih ma Tammin šajj hands his no do-IMPERF nothing ‘His hands can do nothing.’ He can do nothing with his pair of hands. l-Hall wir-rabT the untying and the tying ‘Untying and tying is in his hand.’ He has all the power.

bi-jid-u by hand his

252 (65)

(66)

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tabarak allah ʻala jwaidaat-ha bless God on hands-DIMINI her ‘Blessed be God about her hands.’ Blessed be God about her. la jdiin! no hands ‘What a pair of hands you have!’ I bet you a million that he cannot do it!

The motivation for the hand-for-person metonym is that the hand makes it possible to access the body, of which it is part. The cultural model of the hand in TA can be schematically represented in the following figure:

Wealth and poverty

Dexterity and awkwardness

Productivity and lack of productivity

Power and authority

Thieving

Generosity and meanness

The cultural model of the hand in ta

Control and loss of control

Failure and loss Involvement and solidarity Figure 2

Discouragement

Hand-forperson metonymies

The semantic domains of the cultural model of the hand in TA

253

the raas ‘ head ’ and yidd ‘ hand ’ in tunisian arabic

3 Discussion The investigation of the two body parts of head and hand in TA in sections (1) and (2) above show two cultural models consisting of a set of conceptual metaphors, very often inconsistent with each other but complementing each other to make the cultural model more explanatory of daily life experiences. Why is, for instance, the concept of mental faculty structured by more than one conceptual domain? Lakoff and Johnson’s (1980: 95) answer is that “there is no one metaphor that will do the job.” The conceptual metaphors here seem incoherent and inconsistent with each other as can be seen in THE HEAD IS THE LOCUS OF REASONING, THE HEAD IS A MACHINE, and THE HEAD IS A CONTAINER FOR KNOWLEDGE AND INTELLIGENCE. Yet, “though such metaphors do not provide us with a single consistent concrete image, they are nonetheless coherent and do fit together” (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980: 105). The head as a locus of reasoning presupposes or entails that it should have contents (knowledge and intelligence), which are dealt with by the head as a machine. The following figure shows the constituent conceptual metaphors that make up the cultural model of the head in TA:

THE HEAD IS A CONTAINER FOR REASON, INTELLIGENCE AND KNOWLEDGE

BEING STUBBORN IS HAVING MANIPULABLE HEAD

BEING INDUSTRIOUS IS HAVING ONE'S FEET OVER ONE'S HEAD

Figure 3

THE HEAD IS THE LOCUS OF REASONING THE HEAD IS A MACHINE

The cultural model of the head in ta

BEING DISHONORED IS HAVING ONE'S HEAD DOWN

BEING STUBBORN IS HAVING AN INFLEXIBLE HEAD

BEING HOSPITABLE IS PUTTING PEOPLE OVER ONE'S HEAD

The cultural model of the head in ta in terms of its conceptual metaphors

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It is worth noting that there is a clear division of labor between the cultural model of the head and the cultural model of the hand in TA even though the hand recruits more conceptual metaphors than the head owing to its practical dimension in everyday life. The head takes care of the main function of mental faculty and related issues, which the hand could not possibly have performed because it lacks saliency with them (e.g. the hand cannot be made to think because it is not salient with the mental faculty, whose seat is actually the head). On the other hand, the hand takes care of character traits that are salient with practical matters in the culture. In terms of the conceptual metaphors used in the two cultural models, it should be pointed out that the saliency of the head in the uppermost position in the body makes it possible to conceptualize certain cultural values in terms of the UP-DOWN and VERTICALITY schemas. This saliency of the head with such schemas is not available to the hand, which is culturally manipulated in different ways. It seems that the manipulation of the size, position and temperature of the hand are important cognitive semantic domains in conceptualizing character traits in TA. Recall that size with the heart in TA yields generosity (qalb-u kbiir, his heart is big) and hardness of the heart is indifference and lack of compassion (Maalej, 2008). With the head, size and hardness give the possibility of construing stubbornness in TA in two alternative ways. The following figures show the cultural model of the hand in TA in terms of its conceptual metaphors:

being awkward is having abnormal hands being poor is having one's hands empty

being a thief is having an underweight hand

Figure 4

THE HAND IS A CONTAINER FOR MANUAL SKILL

being a dexterous person is having pretty hands the hand is container for wealth

The cultural model of the hand in ta

performing extraordinary actions is having a hand with extraordinary powers

being productive/ unproductive is having a speedy/ slow hand

being powerful/ powerless is having the size of one's hand manipulated

The conceptual metaphors of the cultural model of the hand in ta ( from 2.1.1. to 2.1.5)

the raas ‘ head ’ and yidd ‘ hand ’ in tunisian arabic

being a miser is having an impermeable hand

being discouraged is feeling pain in the hand

being generous is having one's hand extended forward

being discouraged is when one's hand undergoes a change in temperature being discouraged is losing control over one's hands

The cultural model of the hand in ta

being controlled is being contained in the hand

being a failure or loser is being empty-handed loss control is not to be contained in the hand

Figure 5

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being involved and solidary is making use of one's hands

The conceptual metaphors of the cultural model of the hand in ta ( from 2.1.6. to 2.1.10 plus 2.2. and 2.3.)

Another point worth discussing in this chapter has to do with a shared feature between the two cultural models investigated, which is the container metaphor. The container seems to lend itself to both cultural models since a head has a propensity to be a container. First, it is physically the container of a brain, which in turn contains a mind, which in turn contains cognition. By extension, the head is a container for everything that is in cognition, including cultural models and metaphors and their correlative mental faculty and cultural values. The head is, thus, a container for high mental properties such as thinking, knowledge, and intelligence as part of the brain and mind. On the other hand, the hand is a container not of high-level mental structures but of different contents, which include property such as money and even people as a way of controlling them. Conclusion This paper is a contribution to the theory of embodiment. It has investigated the two body parts of head and hand in TA with a view to seeing which mental faculties, character traits, and cultural values they profile. Owing to its saliency as a seat for the mental faculty in many cultures, the head has confirmed this

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saliency in TA since it functions more like a cross-cultural phenomenon in the conceptualization of the mental faculties. Indeed, it is found to be a seat and a container for reasoning, knowledge, and intelligence. However, the hand in TA, which is curiously less studied in other cultures, seems to be more productive in terms of the host of character traits that it conceptualizes. Indeed, the hand is involved in no less than fifteen character traits in TA, both positive and negative ones. The mental faculties, character traits, and cultural values studied all show these to be embodied in a more or less culturally specific way. The existence of body parts in the conceptualization of abstract domains such as mental faculties, emotions, character traits, and cultural values in TA (Maalej, 2004, 2008, 2011) is testimony to embodied cognition. Semin and Smith (2002: 385) argue that “the relevant ‘situation’ in which cognition takes place is, almost always, a social situation defined by an individual’s group memberships, personal relationships, and social and communicative goals.” Since such conceptualizations are used by most Tunisians, they are part of social embodied cognition. References Aksan, M. (2011). The apocalypse happens when the feet take the position of the head: Figurative uses of ‘head’ and ‘feet’ in Turkish. In Z. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body parts: Studies from various languages and cultures (pp. 241–255). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Foolen, A. (2008). The heart as a source of semiosis: The case of Dutch. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 373–394). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Gaby, A. (2008). Gut feelings: Locating intellect, emotion, and life force in the Thaayorre body. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 27–44). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Geeraerts, D. & C. Gevaert (2008). Hearts and (angry) minds in Old English. In F.  Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 27–44). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Goddard, C. (2008). Contrastive semantics and cultural psychology: English heart vs. Malay hati. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 75–102). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

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Ibarretxe-Antuñano, I. (2008). Guts, heart and liver: The conceptualization of internal organs in Basque. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 103–128). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Ikegami, Y. (2008). The heart: What it means to the Japanese speakers. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 169–190). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Johnson, M. (1987). The body in the mind: The bodily basis of meaning, imagination, and reason. Chicago/London: The University of Chicago Press. Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (1980). Metaphors we live by. Chicago/London: The University of Chicago Press. ———. (1999). Philosophy in the flesh: The embodied mind and its challenge to western thought. New York: Basic Books. Lakoff, G. and M. Turner (1989). More than cool reason: A field guide to poetic metaphor. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Maalej, Z. (2004). Figurative language in anger expressions in Tunisian Arabic: An extended view of embodiment. Metaphor and Symbol, 19(1), 51–75. ———. (2008). The heart and cultural embodiment in Tunisian Arabic. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 395–428). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. ———. (2009). A cognitive-pragmatic perspective on proverbs and its implications for translation. International Journal of Arabic-English Studies (ijaes), 10, 135–154. ———. (2011). Figurative dimensions of 3ayn ‘eye’ in Tunisian Arabic. In Z. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body parts: Studies from various languages and cultures (pp. 213–240). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Maalej, Z. & N. Yu (Eds.) (2011). Embodiment via body parts: Studies from various languages and cultures. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Marmaridou, S. (2011). The relevance of embodiment to lexical and collocational meaning: The case of prosopo ‘face’ in Modern Greek. In Z. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body parts: Studies from various languages and cultures (pp. 23–40). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Morrow, P. R. (2009). Hand and heart: A study of the uses and phraseology associated  with two common nouns. 名古屋学院大学論集　言語・文化篇　第20 巻　第2 号（2009 年3 月) Language and Culture, Publication of Nagoya university, 20: 2. Nagai, T., & M. Hiraga (2011). Inner and outer body parts: The case of har ‘belly’ and koshi ‘lower back’ in Japanese. In Z. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body

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parts: Studies from various languages and cultures (pp. 149–170). Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Niemeier, S. (2008). To be in control: Kind-hearted and cool-headed. The head-heart dichotomy in English. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 349–372). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Nissen, U. K. (2011). Contrasting body parts: Metaphors and metonymies of MOUTH in Danish, English, and Spanish. In Z. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body parts: Studies from various languages and cultures (pp. 71–92). Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Occhi, D. (2008). How to have a HEART in Japanese. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 191–212). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. ———. (2011). A cultural-linguistic look at Japanese ‘eye’ expressions. In Z. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body parts: Studies from various languages and cultures (pp. 149–170). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Semin, G. R., and E. R. Smith (2002). Interfaces of social psychology with situated and embodied cognition. Cognitive Systems Research 3, 385–396. Sharifian, F. (2008). Conceptualizations of del ‘heart-stomach’ in Persian. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 247–266). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. ———. (2011). Conceptualizations of cheshm ‘eye’ in Persian. In Z. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body parts: Studies from various languages and cultures (pp. 197–211). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Sharifian, F., R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.) (2008). Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Siahaan, P. (2008). Did he break your heart or your liver? A contrastive study on metaphorical concepts from the source domain ORGAN in English and in Indonesian. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 45–74). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. ———. (2011). HEAD and EYE in German and Indonesian figurative uses. In Z. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body parts: Studies from various languages and cultures (pp. 93–113). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Vainik, E. (2011). Dynamic body parts in Estonian figurative descriptions of emotion. In Z. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body parts: Studies from various languages

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and cultures (pp. 41–70). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Yoon, K-J. (2008). The Korean conceptualization of heart: An indigenous perspective. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu & S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages (pp. 213– 243). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Yu, N. (2002). Body and emotion: Body parts in Chinese expression of emotion. Pragmatics and Cognition, 10(1/2), 341–367. ———. (2004). The eyes for sight and mind. Journal of Pragmatics, 36, 663–686. ———. (2008a). The Chinese heart as the central faculty of cognition. In F. Sharifian, R. Dirven, N. Yu, and S. Niemeier (Eds.), Culture, body, and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across languages and cultures (pp. 131– 168). Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter. ———. (2008b). The relationship between metaphor, body, and culture. In R. M. Frank, R. Driven, T. Ziemke, & E. Bernardez (Eds.), Body language and mind.Vol.2: Sociocultural situatedness (pp. 387–407). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. ———. (2008c). The relationship between metaphor, body and culture. In R. M. Frank, R. Dirven, T. Ziemke, & E. Bernárdez (Eds.), Body, language, and mind (Vol. 2): Sociocultural situatedness (pp. 387–407). Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter. ———. (2009). The Chinese heart in a cognitive perspective: Culture, body, and language. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter. ———. (2011). Speech organs and linguistic activity/function in Chinese. In Z. Maalej & N. Yu (Eds.), Embodiment via body parts: Studies from various languages and cultures (pp. 117–148). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company.

What Hands/Arms Can Say: A Corpus-Based Analysis of the Swahili Body-Part Terms Mkono and Mikono1 Serena Talento Abstract The present chapter deals with the conceptualisations of the body part terms hand/arm in Swahili, a Bantu language spoken in Tanzania and Kenya, and as a lingua franca within the surrounding area.  The study presents an array of grammaticalised expressions, embodied metaphors and metonymies activated in order to interpret some aspects, entities and experiences both of a concrete and an abstract nature that are not immediately related to bodily experiences but which make use of body-related references. The analysis is done by observing the results of corpus-based research. The identification of patterns of usage associated with a particular term and the subsequent identification of potential and recurring meanings of each pattern helps in identifying metaphorical and metonymical meanings of the terms analysed.



Outlook

Th­­e bodily experience is a favoured term of reference to conceptualise the experiences we have every day as a result of our interaction with the physical and cultural environment (Lakoff and John­son 1980; Johnson 1987; Lakoff 1987). In our human experience the body is the first object we perceive and ex-plore and it becomes the tool we use to make contact and, therefore, to comprehend what we see, what we feel and what we do. The body naturally 1 This article is based on work carried out within the framework of a research project at the University of Naples “L’Orientale” during the academic year 2009/2010 under the supervision of Dr. Maddalena Toscano. A former version of this article was presented at “The Body in Language: Lexicon, Metaphor, Grammar and Culture”, University of Warsaw, October 21–22, 2011. I am grateful and thankful to Maddalena Toscano for her help and encouragement and Elena Bertoncini Zúbková for her valuable comments. I owe also a special thanks to Mahmoud Adam and Thèrèse N. Marshall, for their comments that greatly improved the quality of the language of the article. I would also like to extend my thanks to Iwona KraskaSzlenk, Matthias Brenzinger and an anonymous revisor for their reviews and useful suggestions, which helped in a great way to improve this paper. For any errors or inadequacies that may remain in this work, of course, the responsibility is entirely my own. © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi ��.��63/9789004274297_�14

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provides a source domain for deriving extended con­cepts and structuring numerous other domains. The present study is a corpus-based analysis of the Swahili body part term mkono (cl. 3, ‘hand, arm’) and its plural mikono (cl. 4), as well as the locative forms mkononi (‘in the hand’) and mikononi (‘in the hands/ arms’). The behaviour of such terms within both nominal or verbal constructions is scrutinised in order to detect some metaphori­cal and metonymical extensions used in the conceptualisation of abstract entities and experiences, as well as the categorisation of concrete entities. The approach adopted for the analysis follows the cognitive linguis­tics guideline that looks at metaphors as useful tools for the comprehen­sion and interpretation of the world. The research identified the uses of the terms mkono and mikono: a)

in the description of the world—in particular through the definition of objects and space; b) in the description of interpersonal relationships—as a symbol of social interaction and participation in collective life; c) in the conceptualisation of the notion of POSSESSION, DOMINION, AUTHORITY. The Research: Methods and Tools The data for this research has been collected from an electronic corpus, the advantage of which is that it contains both a large amount of data and, above all, authentic texts. The search for concordances, namely the occurrences of a word within a text and the indication of the frequency with which such a word occurs together with the preceding and following linguistic context, can help in find­ ing the sequences of words that occur more frequently; thus, the procedure rapidly provides information about the specific uses of a word (Tognini Bonelli 2001: 3–4). A frequently cited shortcoming of such an approach is due to its nature: a corpus is a finished object or, in other words, it consists of a closed and countable set of texts. Therefore, it will inevitably exclude lots of actu­ally produced performances.2 However, this kind of approach does give indi­cations about

2 For a more detailed discussion about the criticism on corpus methodology and the subsequent responses by corpus linguists see McEnery and Wilson 2001: 5–13; McEnery et al. 2006: 131–144.

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the frequency with which some linguistic features oc­cur, hence facilitating the observation of the structures in which a lexeme appears its behaviour and functions. All these allow the tracing of a pre­liminary semantic frame. The corpus used for the research is the electronic corpus created at the Department of Studies and Research on Africa and Arab Countries of the University of Naples “L’Orientale”. It mainly consists of modern literary texts by Tanzanian authors: novels, short stories and some poetry together with the transcription of oral tales and a small set of political texts.3 A total number of 1,644 tokens have been extracted from the corpus and divided accordingly into the four forms as follows: Mkono 767 Mikono 537 Mikononi 182 Mkononi 158 The augmentative (kono) and diminutive (kikono) forms are not con­sidered within this chapter because the only two occurrences found within the corpus had literal meanings. The research was carried out in various phases: 1) The search of the forms within the corpus; 2) The observation of the contexts of the forms; 3) The grouping of the forms according to the grammatical struc­tures in which they occur; 4) The identification of the relevant information-carrying context; 5) The selection of the context to be used as examples; 6) The identification of recurring semantic values; 7) The grouping of the forms according to the semantic value. The analysis of the selected contexts started from the observation of the syntagm in which the form is put, and finally of the whole sentence that contains the syntagm in order to detect those structures that refer to a specific semantic core. Therefore, the identification of metaphorical and metonymical meanings has syntagmatic, rather than semantic, criteria as its starting point. This al­lows the identification of patterns of usage associated with a word and the subsequent detection of potential and recurring meanings associated with each pattern (Hanks 2004: 255). 3 The list of the Swahili texts forming the corpus is reported in Appendix one.

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Defining Mkono

What do we mean when we say mkono? Perceptual experience is regarded as theoretically primary in body-part nomenclature. One aspect of perception considered important for parti­ tioning the body into segments is shape: visual discontinuity in objects, as well as in the human body, can actually determine segmentation into parts (Enfield et al. 2006: 140–41). However, the rela­tionship between visual discontinuity and partitioning into segments is not determinate for body-part naming. If many languages distinguish hand and arm on the basis of such visual discontinuity carried out by the existence of joints, many other lan­guages, Swahili included, do not have two distinct linguistic categories—the same applies to mguu which is used to identify both leg and foot. It could be asked whether mkono refers, in a general fashion, to that body part from the shoulder down to the middle finger tip. While it would sometimes seem so, in other cases it would seem more reasonable to claim that mkono may have different meanings, hand and/or arm, which can be de­duced from the context: (1a) Mkono wa Rashidi ulizama tena kwenye mfuko wa suruali. ‘The hand of Rashidi sank again in his pocket.’ From this example it could more reasonably be imagined that it is the hand that is sunk in the pocket and not the whole arm, whereas in the following example it is plausible to picture someone struggling with somebody else’s arms: (1b) Nilijaribu kuachana na mikono yao nikipiga kelele [. . .] ‘I tried to wiggle out of their arms while shouting [. . .].’ However, this may represent the point of view of such languages that keep these categories separate. And this is not the case. Although in the translations (all mine) of the following examples a choice between hand and arm has been necessary, such disambiguation should not be contemplated as crucial. The objective of the research is not, in fact, to ex­am­ ine when mkono means hand and when it means arm, but rather to observe the metaphoric and metonymic uses that mkono produces. It is for this reason that the value of translation is not being considered, apart from a few exceptions, within the analysis. In the following sections, some of the main meaning clusters regard­ ing mkono inferred during the analysis are grouped under four dif­fer­ent

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headings. It should be noted that the quoted examples do not cover the whole range of possible expressions that make use of mkono, but in­clude only those that refer to the categories illustrated at the beginning of this chapter. No Metaphor Before observing such extended meanings of mkono, it should be said that, during the first stages of the analysis, when mkono was ob­served within a verbal construction, it was noticed that the structure mkono + verb seems to convey, at least in the expressions found in the cor­pus, a literal meaning. When the subjectverb agreement takes mkono as a subject there seems to be no metaphor. Furthermore, it has been observed that there are very few cases (23 out of 102) when the verb agreement is with the nominal class of mkono or mikono compared with the cases in which the verbs associated with mkono agree with a personal subject. In most cases, it is not the hand that carries out an action, rather it is the human being who causes a movement or a gesture to be carried out by the hand. Actually, most of those verbs (with a personal agreement) takes the causative extension stressing the idea to cause someone to do some­ thing, in this case to the hand. The following remarks could be put forward. It has been noticed that in those cases when the verb-agreement takes mkono as subject, a small number of such verbs expresses emotions and feelings that the individual cannot control such as pain, anger, fear: -uma (‘to ache/ hurt’), -tetemeka (‘to tremble’), -konda (‘to grow thin’), or even states that are not due to human volition as -lemaa (‘to be crip­pled/deformed). Such consideration is illustrated by a particular example in which mkono takes the verb -ota, ‘grow, germinate’ used for plants and hair: (2) Mikono yake ilikuwa imeota dasi kwa kamba ya kisima. ‘On his hands corns had grown caused by the well rope.’ It is interesting to observe that, unlike other languages where the subject would have been corns, in Swahili the subject is the hand that carries out the action to produce such excrescence. However, the idea of an action being beyond one’s control is not to be re­garded as a rule. Some other verbs, such as -shika (‘to hold’), -sokota (‘to twist’), -fanya kazi (‘to work’), do not follow this assumption.

Defining Objects

The hand and the arm belong to the basic body parts, those parts that a language consultant will name first if asked to name examples of body parts and, most of

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all, as Heine has suggested (1997: 134), those parts which are more likely to be used as structural templates in order to:

. . . denote both other body parts, as well as other items not connected with the human body—that is, concepts which are perceived to be related to the former with reference to shape, location, and/or function. In this regard, the construction mkono + connective (or ‘genitive partici­ple’) –a + N is highly prolific in allowing the extension of the meaning or the development of new meanings. A source term can historically develop a range of meanings, the strati­ fication of which could sometimes be traced by just consulting sec­ondary sources, namely dictionaries. Numerous dictionaries consulted refer to mkono as ­something similar to a hand, an arm, that stretches, projects or grasps. Therefore, the dictionary entries suggest an understanding of mkono as everything that resembles or does the same thing as this limb.4 The extended meaning is totally represented by the following exam­ples extracted from the corpus in which mkono is used to derive non-bodily concepts. The body part is used to describe items that have no associations whatsoever with the hu­man body. What occurs is a conceptual transfer that moves on a con­crete-concrete level as well as a concrete-abstract level by means of a transfer of both shape and function properties, enabling the definition of both concrete and figurative meanings. Concrete 

 Concrete Transfer

Shape properties transfer: (3a) mkono wa kiti, ‘arm of the chair’ (lit. ‘arm of chair’) Ahmed Ali, [. . .] amekaa juu ya kiti cha kizungu hali mguu wake wa kuume kaupitisha juu ya mkono wa kiti. ‘Ahmed Ali, [. . .] was sitting on a European-style chair, with his right leg that had passed over the arm of the chair.’ 5 Function properties transfer:

4 The dictionaries consulted for the analysis include Madan 1931; Johnson 1939; Sacleux 1941; Krapf 1964; Merlo Pick 1978; Lenselaer 1983; TUKI 2001; TUKI 2004. 5 It is interesting to note that English has the same construction as Swahili.

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(3b) mkono wa kitasa, ‘doorknob’ (lit. ‘hand of lock’) Polepole, niliusogelea mlango. Niliushika mkono wa kitasa. ‘Slowly I approached the door. I seized the doorknob.’ (3c) mkono wa ndoo, ‘handle of the bucket’ (lit. ‘hand of bucket’) Alipoona Biti Kondo anainua mkono wa ndoo, alivuta debe lake. ‘When she saw Biti Kondo lifting the handle of the bucket, she pulled her tank.’ (3d) mkono wa mashine, ‘mechanical arm’ (lit. ‘hand of ma­chine’) Mkono wa Kingo ni mwepesi mno. Unaenda mbio-mbio kama mkono wa mashine. ‘The arm of Kingo is really quick. It goes fast as a mechanical arm.’ Concrete 

 Abstract Transfer

(3e) mkono wa kampuni, ‘branch of company’ (lit. ‘arm of company’) [. . .] ilikuwa jambo la kawaida kabisa kuona mkono mmoja wa kampuni ukishughulikia ujenzi wa barabara mpya. ‘[. . .] it was an absolutely usual thing to see a branch of company involved in the construction of a new road.’ In all the previous examples mkono emerges as a projecting element that enables us to grasp things or in­dicates things the functions of which mimic the movements of mkono. In what follows, a different construction is presented, that is when mkono is not the head but the modifier of the syntagm. The structure, therefore, is N + connective –a + mkono/mikono: (4a) kitambaa cha mkono, ‘handkerchief’ (lit. ‘cloth of hand’) Mara yule kijana akatoa kitambaa chake cha mkono kilicho­kunjwa kwa umaridadi [. . .]. ‘Suddenly that youngster took out his handkerchief that was folded with care [. . .].’ (4b) saa ya mkono, ‘wrist watch’ (lit. ‘clock of hand’)6 Tena akatazama saa yake ya mkono. Saa nne za usiku. ‘He looked again at his wrist watch. Ten p.m.’ 6 It is also used with the plural saa ya mikono. The meaning does not change. Saa ya mkono is different from saa ya mfuko (‘pocket watch’, lit. ‘clock of bag’) and saa ya ukuta (‘clock’, lit. ‘clock of wall’).

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(4c) picha ya mkono, ‘painting’ (lit. ‘picture of hand’) Sofa seti aina tatu, zote kutoka Ulaya, rediogramu, televisheni inchi ishirini na sita, mapambo, zulia jipya, picha za mkono zili­zotoka Ulaya [. . .]. ‘Sofa sets of three kinds, all coming from Europe, stereo, a twenty six inch television, decorations, a new carpet, paintings from Europe [. . .].’ These examples point out to the concept of something that can be kept in the hands or, something handy or easy to handle. As regards picha ya mkono in (4c), the notion of hand­made, craft-work—and thus not a photo or a poster—is more appropriate. This idea is made more explicit in the following example in which the expression kazi ya mkono (‘work of hand’) is added: (5) Ukuta mwingine ulikuwa na picha mbili kubwa, zote za kazi ya mkono. ‘On another wall there were two big pictures, both hand-painted.’ At this point the case of mkono + locative should be introduced. The kind of con­struction considered so far (that is N + connective –a + mkono/ mikono) shows that mkono can take the locative suffix -ni. The meaning does not change and often constructions with mkono with or with­out the locative can co-exist.7 (6a) kioo cha mkononi, ‘hand-mirror’ (lit. ‘mirror of [in] hand) Na kabla Miriam hajajibu, Asumini alikirukia kioo cha mkononi kilichoku­ wepo mezani, “Tazama . . . tazama jinsi ulivyopendeza . . .” ‘And before Miriam could answer, Asumini rushed to the hand-mirror that was on the table, “Look . . . look how you are beauti­ful . . .” ’ (6b) simu ya mkononi, ‘mobile phone’ (lit. ‘telephone of [in] hand) Alipanda jukwaani, huku akiwa ameshika simu ya mkononi. ‘He went onto the stage while he was holding his mobile phone.’ (6c) saa ya mkononi, ‘wrist watch’ (lit. ‘watch of [in] hand) Aliangalia saa yake ya mkononi. ‘He looked at his wrist watch.’ The presence of the locative emphasises the idea of an object that can be kept in the hand(s) or even on the hand(s). The last example in (6c) is particularly interesting. When we wear a wristwatch we actually wear it on our wrist. Even if there is a term for wrist in Swahili, kiwiko (cha mkono), it is not used here. A similar example has been 7 Cf., for instance, examples (4b) and (6c).

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extracted from the corpus in which pingu, the ‘handcuffs’, are put on the hands and not on the wrist: (7) Walitoka nje wameongozwa na askari, pingu mikononi. ‘They were led out handcuffed (lit. ‘with handcuffs on the hands’) by the guard.’

Defining the Left/Right Spatial Orientation

Apart from the description of objects, the construction mkono + connective –a + N proves useful to conceptualise the spatial orientation domain, specifically right and left. Even if the extremities are not so relevant as a source for spatial concepts (such as the head or the trunk), it is commonly assumed that the human hand is a primary locus for develop­ing terms for left-right orientation in many languages (Heine 1997: 43). The syntagm mkono + connective –a + kushoto/kulia that gives life to mkono wa kulia (lit. ‘hand for eating’) and mkono wa kushoto (lit. ‘hand of awkward’), are used to designate the right hand and the left hand as in examples (8a) and (8b): (8a) Tuza alikuwa hawezi kutumia mkono wake wa kulia. ‘Tuza couldn’t use her right hand.’ (8b) Hata kwa kula alikuwa akitumia mkono wa kushoto. ‘She even used her left hand for eating.’ But the meanings of mkono wa kulia/wa kushoto can shift to the spatial concepts right and left as illu­strated in examples (9a) and (9b): (9a) Akakaa akatazama mkono wa kulia na mkono wa kushoto, asione mtu yoyote. ‘He looked to the right and to the left, he didn’t see anyone.’ (9b) Karibu na mlango huu kuna chumba cha Mariam Mapozi na mtu wake, kwa mkono wa kushoto, na mkono wa kulia chumba cha Bi Mtumwa. ‘Next to this door there is Mariam Mapozi and her husband’s room on the left and on the right Bi Mtumwa’s room.’8 8 During linguistic analysis an alternative term for right (hand) has been identified, namely mkono wa kuume. Kuumeni (with the locative suffix -ni) means ‘on the paternal side’. The study by Alice Werner (1904) on the terms used in 37 Bantu languages to say left hand and

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Mkono as a Symbol for Social Interaction and Participation in Collective Life

So far it has been examined how mkono enables us to have contact with objects and the world by defining spatial orientation. Apart from those categorisations denoting a dimension that is external to that of a bodily nature, mkono acts as an element that enables us to have contact with other people around us. A more intimate di­mension of human emotional experiences is approached in the following discussion. If the construction mkono + connective –a is followed by an abstract noun denoting a feeling, that feeling is conceptualised so that the ab­stract symbol is given meaning by evoking something concrete of a bod­ily nature. For instance, if I give someone the hand of a certain feeling the hand gesture focuses the feeling that is shared and passed onto another person. This point is illustrated in such examples as: (10a) mkono wa rambirambi, ‘condolence’ (lit. ‘hand of condolence’) Ustadi Salehe [. . .] aliona hana budi ila kwenda kumpa mkono wa rambirambi mke wa rafiki yake. ‘Ustadi Salehe [. . .] saw there was no choice but to go and offer his condo­ lences to his friend’s wife.’ (10b) mkono wa pongezi, ‘congratulation’ (lit. ‘hand of congratulations’) Hapo akajipa mkono wa pongezi mwenyewe kwa kuwa bingwa. ‘In that moment he congratulated himself for being a cham­pion.’ In these examples the hand is depicted as something that empathetically connects us with our interlocutor and that directly passes onto the other person what we need to communicate. Unlike other feelings or moods considered as visceral and therefore con­ceptualised by means of refer­ence to internal body parts, such as heart (a privileged locus of emo­tions), liver, spleen and so on, in or­der to stress their inner and deeper character,9 the feelings referred to by the examples above are not bound to be hidden, rather they are bound to be right hand demonstrates that the notion right is designated by means of a range of concepts among which the male hand, whereas the notion left has a more vague sense but it can make reference to weak hand or female hand (112–15). It must be observed that a form such as mkono wa kuuke referring to kuukeni, ‘on the maternal side’ has not been extracted from the corpus—even if it exists. 9 For specific studies on the conceptualisations of internal body organs see Wierzbicka 1999; Peña Cervel 2001; Enfield 2002; Enfield and Wierzbicka 2002; Niemeier 2003; Sharifian et al. 2008.

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openly expressed. It is for this reason that the choice may fall on a body part that can physi­cally come into contact with other individuals and, therefore, can become a vehicle of feelings. In addition to the conceptualisation of feelings, mkono can also con­ ceptualise our participation in social life as a part of a group. A physical participation is appealed by means of the expression mkono kwa mkono (lit. ‘hand with hand’) usually combined with the verb -la, ‘to eat’. Since, generally and traditionally, a meal is eaten in one large dish from which everybody can eat, helping themselves by using the right hand in turns, such expression refers to the act of eating together, as a sign of intimacy and sharing. And even if we do not consider eating from one single dish but just eating close to each other with the hands almost touching respectively, the expression maintains the implication of closeness. It makes little difference if in the example that follows the subject is referred to as somebody who proves not to be pleased by such intimacy: (11) Lulu aliona kinyume au tuseme kinyefu-nyefu kula mkono kwa mkono na watu wengine. ‘Lulu saw inappropriate or let’s say nauseating eating together with (hand with hand) other people.’ At this point, it is pertinent to quote a popular Swahili proverb Mkono mmoja haulei mwana, ‘a single hand cannot nurse a child’ (Ndalu and King’ei 1989: 193). Such a quotation is useful in introducing the meto­nymic uses of the hand that stands for a person and, as will be highlighted below, for a personality. The hand, the single hand as the proverb says, stands for the individual, whereas many hands stand for the society and the community. The example (11) refers to a physical participation, but mkono can also convey another form of participation that is an emotional participation by means of the expression kuunga mkono (ku- is the infi­nitive marker). The verb -unga means ‘to join’, ‘to unite’. To join one’s hand stands for supporting, siding with or agree­ing with the interlocutor. The intellectual or emotional participation is shown through the physical act of adding one’s hand that metonymically represents the individual and, more precisely his thoughts and points of view.10 This phenomenon is elucidated by the following examples:

10

It should be added that the phrase is highly grammaticalised. Kraska-Szlenk (2005: 171) has shown, in fact, that it could also occur with inanimate subjects.

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(12a) Wanakisomo walimuunga mkono mwalimu. ‘The students supported the teacher.’ (12b) Ujasiri wa kina Seti Benjamin waliokufa katika kuliunga mkono Azimio la Arusha. ‘The bravery of the people of Seti Benjamin who died for ap­proving the Arusha Declaration.’ (12c) Mheshimiwa Spika, mimi naunga mkono hoja hii kwa nguvu zangu zote.11 ‘Honourable President, I support this proposal with all my strength.’ As stated above, all the examples presented in this heading depict social interaction and participation in social life. Such a semantic bond is further demon­ strated by another example: kuacha mkono. The verb -acha literally means ‘to stop doing something’ but also ‘to leave, to abandon, to separate from’. This expression can be interpreted as to die conceptualised through the physical act of removing one’s hand from the totality of the community. It is a more intimate expression in comparison with other verbs such as -fa, -fariki, -kata roho (‘to die’) and can occur in the form mtu ameacha mkono, ‘someone died’, or with the infix for the object complement of the 2nd person plural -tu-, mtu ametuacha mkono, ‘some­one died (lit. ‘to us’) as in the following example: (13) HERI: Nieleze wewe basi, bwana. Tafadhali twambie yaliyojiri. Twambie kweli tafadhali, usitufiche. MZEE:  Sitaficha, kweli nitakwambieni, lakini muwe na nyoyo za subira . . . Mwenzetu ametuacha mkono! HERI: Nani? JUMA: Nani? MZEE: Mama watoto- mwenye nyumba hii! ‘HERI: So, explain it to me. Please tell us what happened. Tell us the truth please, don’t hide it from us. MZEE: I won’t hide it, I will tell you the truth, but please be pa­tient . . . Our friend died! HERI: Who? JUMA: Who? MZEE: The landlady of this house!’ 11

It should also be noted that such an expression turns out to be highly recurrent within political texts.

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Mkono in the Conceptualisation of Notions of POSSES­S ION, DOMINION, AUTHORITY

The hands are those body parts that permit grasping, seizing, tight­ening; in the same way, the arms permit holding and hugging. In this sec­tion, it is discussed how the concrete experience of holding something or some­one in the hands/ arms is associated with different cognitive do­mains and therefore how the abstractness of a non-physical experience is ex­plained by making reference to a physical experience. The starting point of the discussion is the association of mkono/mikono with the cognitive domain of possession. The association between holding something in one’s own hands and be­ing in possession of that thing has been widely investigated and it is not a peculiar feature of Swahili, indeed, it is also common to many other lan­guages. In some cases this has led the body part hand to develop as a marker of possession (Heine 1997: 83–108), or the development of the verbal possession (“A has/owns B”) from a construction of the kind “B is in A’s hands” or “A seizes B” (Heine et al. 1991: 158). Previous studies and research related such concrete experience with the cognitive domain of possession and control (see Heine and Claudi 1989; Ahn and Kwon 2007). First of all, it is observed how this mapping is encoded in some Swahili expressions by reviewing a range of expressions that make metaphoric and metonymic uses of mkono and mikono. Afterwards, building on the studies mentioned above, it is discussed how the notion of possession weaves a semantic network that designates the hands/arms as a safe or a dangerous place. In these settings the use of the plural mikono and the locative suffix -ni is prevalent. The examples below illustrate the as­sociation of mkono/mikono with the cognitive domain of possession. If I have something in my hands (and sometimes in my arms) I own that thing: (14a) kuwa na (‘to have’) + N + mikononi (‘in the hands’): “Kamwe usifundishe jambo ambalo huna hakika nalo, na usidai kuwa na kweli mikononi mwako.” ‘Do not teach us something you are not sure of at all, and do not claim to have the truth in your hands (to be in possession of the truth).’ (14b) Lau kuwa alichokitaka kilikuwamo mikononi mwake, angekigu­gumia na kukata kiu yake. ‘If only what he wished was in his hands, he would have gulped and slaked his thirst.’

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In the same manner the verb -salia (‘to remain, to be left over’) conveys a similar meaning. If something is left in my hands it becomes mine: (15) Nia yako ni kunifanya niamini kwamba wameibiwa ili mali yote isalie mikononi mwako kwa ajili yako na vizazi vyako. ‘Your aim is to make me believe that they have been robbed so that all the property could be left in your hands for you and your descendants.’ For this reason, as the following example shows, if something is able to come out of my hands it is because I possess it in the first instance: (16) Maana kwani apatane na Hamed bin Muhammed, nasi zamani tu­napi­ gana? Itokee amani katika mikono ya Hamed bin Mu­hammed? ‘Why should he reconcile with Hamed bin Muhammed if we have been fighting for a long time? Should the peace come out of the hands of Hamed bin Muhammed?’ On the contrary, the expression mikono mitupu, ‘empty hands’ conveys the idea of lacking resources, to possess nothing in terms of concrete and abstract possessions. To have empty hands means that we do not have what we need that is symbolically placed in the hands:12 (17a) Tuliona matumaini yetu yakifutika, lakini nani aliyafuta? Kweli tulirudi mikono mitupu—mimi na mke wangu. ‘We saw all our hopes erased, but who had erased them? In truth we came back with empty hands—I and my wife.’ (17b) Mapenzi na starehe havipatikani kwa mikono mitupu. ‘Love and prosperity are not obtainable with empty hands.’ The notion of possession without doubt relates to one of control/dominion. If I have something (in my hands) indicating own­ership of that thing, this means that I have complete control over it. Mkono can actually be related to the notion of control if it is re­ferred to as long, -refu. Mkono mrefu surely has a literal meaning: 12

The expression refers to another popular Swahili proverb, Mkono mtupu haulambwi, ‘an empty hand is not licked’ (Ndalu and King’ei 1989: 193). An example of this kind has been detected in the corpus: “Ah, maskini miye, mkono mtupu haulambwi!”, “Oh, poor me, an empty hand is not licked!”

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(18) Aliuona mkono wake mrefu ukinyoka na kuchota kitu [. . .]. ‘He saw his long arm stretching out and taking something [. . .].’ However, when mkono mrefu is associated, for in­stance, with a term such as seri­ kali, ‘government’, different meanings are implied. Saying that the gov­ernment has a long arm means that its control is very strong and it would be diffi­cult to avoid it. The expression mkono mrefu designates a thie­vish, mi­schievous and cunning person. And also someone whose authority is far reaching. Above, it was discussed that the hand stands metonymically for a person. In the following examples the body part stands rather for personality: (19a) Mayai Waziri wa Maradhi aliogopa mkono mrefu wa Serikali. ‘Mayai Minister of Illnesses feared the long arm of the Govern­ment.’ (19b) Maana sirikali ina mkono mrefu popote hakuna pahala pasipo­weza kufika mkono wa sirikali. ‘Because the government has a long arm everywhere, there is no place the arm of the government cannot reach.’13 However, it is interesting to note that if the adjective mrefu is associated to the plural term mikono, the figurative meaning is immediately re­placed by a material or literal meaning. Mikono mirefu actually means the ‘long sleeves’ of a garment: (20) Alikuwa amevaa kanzu nyepesi ya mikono mirefu, [. . .]. ‘She was wearing a light robe with long sleeves [. . .].’ The notion of control/dominion is explored by focussing on the expressions kuwa mikononi (‘to be’ + ‘hands/arms’ + loca­tive suf­fix -ni, ‘in’), kuwa katika mikono (‘to be’ + preposition ‘between, in’ + ‘hands/arms’), kuwa ndani ya mikono (‘to be’ + preposition ‘in’ + con­nective ‘of’ + ‘hands/arms’). Being in someone’s hands/arms can be interpreted with a literal meaning: (21) Vumilia alipotambua kwamba alikuwa mikononi mwa mama yake alianza kulia kwa kwikwi. ‘When Vumilia realised she was in her mother’s arms she burst out sobbing.’ 13

Sirikali is an alternative spelling for serikali.

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In other contexts, however, it can convey a figurative meaning: kuwa mi­kononi/ katika mikono/ndani ya mikono can indicate the idea of being under somebody’s control, in somebody’s power or at somebody’s mercy as illustrated in the examples (22a) through (24): (22a) kuwa mkononi, ‘to be in somebody’s hands’ “Maisha yangu Fauz yamo mikononi mwenu? Na maisha yenu nyinyi yamo mikononi mwa nani? ‘My life Fauz is in your (pl.) hands? And your life is in whose hands?’ (22b) Mheshimiwa Spika, nguvu na uwezo wa kufufua uchumi uko mi­kononi mwetu. ‘Honorable President, the power and the possibility to recover the economy is in your hands.’ (22c) Mambo haya sasa yamo mikononi mwa Umma. ‘These things now are in the hands of the community.’ (23) kuwa katika mikono, ‘to be in somebody’s hands’ Lakini hapakuwa na haja ya kuogopa maadam yumo katika mi­kono ya mwanamke. Mikono ya mwanamke? Ndicho kitu cha kutegemea? ‘There was no need to fear because he was in the hands of a woman. The hands of a woman? Is it something to rely on?’ (24) kuwa ndani ya mikono, ‘to be in somebody’s hands’ “Ninajua yakini kuwa kupona kwangu na nchi yangu kuko ndani ya mikono yako.” ‘Indeed, I know that my recovery and that of my country is in your hands.’ If, as stated above, somebody wields control and dominion over us it is ­presupposed that such a person has authority; this individual must be in a dominant position or must have ascendancy and exert influ­ence on the dominated element. If I leave (-acha) something in the hands of somebody it means that I am leaving it under someone else’s control and, therefore, authority: (25) Akaiacha mali yote hiyo mikononi mwa nduguye. ‘He left all possessions in the hands of his brother.’

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The notion of authority and influence is made clearer when considering some verbs expressing the state of being in somebody’s hands/arms that do not provide for volition as -acha does, but that do ex­press fortui­tousness, and thus a state that has arisen independently of one’s will. This is the case of verbs such as -ingia, that literally means ‘to en­ter’ but that is used here in the sense of ‘to end up’, -anguk(i)a14 (‘to fall down’) or -jitia (‘to throw oneself’). These expressions mark the en­trance in the sphere of influence or on the grounds of somebody else’s authority: (26a) Bi Time aliomba Mungu amhidi na kumnusuru mtoto huyo asije akaingia mikononi mwa mapaka shume, aendelee kujilinda kama anavyojilinda.  ‘Bi Time prayed God to lead the right way and to defend that daughter so that she wouldn’t end up in the arms of predators, so that she would continue to preserve herself as she was doing.’ (26b) Biashara hiyo ilikuwa imeangukia mikononi mwake kama bahati [. . .].  ‘This business fell into his hands as a luckiness [. . .].’ (26c) Hili halikumshangaza sana, kwani baada ya kumpiga Katibu Lu­pituko, alijua wazi kwamba alikuwa amejitia mwenyewe mik­ononi mwa adui zake.  ‘That did not surprise him a lot, because after having hit the Sec­retary Lupituko, he perfectly knew he had thrown himself in the arms of his enemy.’ The examples selected in this section have, gen­erally speaking, recalled meanings with a negative nuance. However, this is not the rule. In other contexts mkono/mikono can have positive nuances, as the expression kwa mikono miwili, ‘with both hands, arms’, illustrates. This expression often occurs with verbs such as -karibisha (‘to welcome’), -pokea (‘to receive, to welcome’). Welcoming and receiving somebody with both hands/arms, presumably wide open, means receiving someone under one’s own protection, taking care and looking after the person we have accepted by means of our gesture. The expression emphasises a sense of profound hospitality and respect:

14

The (-i-) designates the applicative extension which expresses the direction of the action of the agent towards another person, an object or a place (Bertoncini Zúbková: 123).

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(27) Nataka kuhakikisha kuwa atapokewa kwa mikono miwili kama astahilivyo. ‘I want to make sure that he will be welcomed with two arms (with open arms) as he deserves.’ The hands, the arms are now conceived as something that can accept and preserve, the boundary of a place where protection and care can be given: (28) “Usiogope wala usiwe na wasiwasi. Ukiwa umo mikononi mwake, ndio umo mikononi mwangu.” ‘Do not fear and do not be worried. If you are in her hands, you are indeed in my hands.’ It is for this reason that to express the idea that a child has grown up under the custody and care of someone, the latter person’s hands/arms are referred to, as the fol­lowing examples show: (29a)  kutunzwa mikononi, ‘to be taken care of/looked after in the hands/ arms’:  Huyu ni binti yangu na umemtoa mikononi mwangu. Umtunze kama alivyokuwa akitunzwa mikononi mwangu.  ‘She’s my daughter and you have taken her away from my arms. Take care of her like she had been taken care of in my arms.’ (29b)  kudhibitiwa katika mikono, ‘to be guarded/protected in the hands/ arms’:  Toka kuzaliwa alidhibitiwa katika mikono ya mwanadamu iliyomsarifu [. . .]  ‘Since her birth she had been protected in the hands of the man who took care of her [. . .].’ It could be concluded that, if within some examples mkono/mikono have designated a dangerous place, a place where we could be subject to somebody else’s influence or subjugation, idealised as a grip, in some other examples the body part designates a safe place suitable for of­fering shelter, attention and care. It should be made clear, however, that the negativeness or the posi­tiveness is not determined by the verbs that ac­company mkono or mik­ono, but rather by who is the “owner” of the hand(s)/arm(s) at issue. It is only such ownership that transforms the body parts into either a danger­ous grip or a safe shelter. All the metaphorical senses discussed within this last heading are pro­ gressive extensions derived from the association of mkono/mikono with the

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cognitive dominion of possession. The research has, then, sketched a semantic network of these senses that have been structured in the fol­lowing diagram in (30). Though, in some cases the boundaries between these notions are definitely loose and the metaphorical meanings could involve more than one sense simultaneously. (30) The semantic networks of mkono POSSESSION

Kuwa na kitu mikononi ‘to have something in the hands/arms’ Kusalia mikononi ‘to remain in the hands/arms’ Mikono mitupu ‘empty hands’

DOMINION/CONTROL

AUTHORITY/INFLUENCE

PROTECTION/CARE

Mkono mrefu ‘the long arm’ Kuwa mikononi / katika mikono / ndani  ya mikono ‘to be in the hands/arms’ Kuacha + N + mikononi ‘to leave + N + in the hands’ Kuingia mikononi ‘to end up in the hands/arms’ Kujitia mikononi ‘to throw oneself in the hands/arms’ Kuangukia mikononi ‘to fall down in the hands/arms’ Kuwa mikononi ‘to be in the hands/arms’ Kwa mikono miwili ‘with both hands, arms’ Kutunzwa mikononi ‘to be taken care of in the hands/arms’ Kudhibitiwa katika mikono ‘to be guarded in the hands/arms’

SAFE PLACE / DANGEROUS PLACE

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Concluding Remarks

This chapter has traced the conceptualisations of the body parts hand/arm used to give structure to other domains by means of metaphorical and metonymical mechanisms. This has been done by observing the data of a corpus-based analysis that has distinguished and investigated the uses of mkono in material, spatial, interactional and abstract con­texts. The data have highlighted how the term mkono and its plural mikono are con­ceptualised in order to define and categorise entities and notions dis­tinct from that of a bodily nature. Whilst some of these conceptual meta­phors and metonymies have analogues in other languages, many others do not. Attention has been called to the use of the term mkono in categorising objects which are similar to such body parts with respect to form and functions (e.g. mkono wa kiti, ‘arm of chair’, mkono wa mashine, ‘mechanical arm’), objects that can be seized or that allow one to seize (e.g. mkono wa ki­tasa, ‘doorknob’, mkono wa ndoo, ‘handle of the bucket’), or handy ob­jects (e.g. kitambaa cha mkono, ‘handkerchief’, simu ya mkononi, ‘mo­bile phone’). It has been then observed how mkono is used to determine the spatial orientation. For example, mkono wa kulia and mkono wa ku­shoto respectively right hand and left hand, are used to designate spatially right and left. Mkono is, therefore, used as a connective element which allows us to make contact with the world, namely its objects and its space. In other cases mkono serves to connect us to other individuals who inhabit this world. Mkono can, indeed, be used when we want to convey our feelings to our interlocutor (it is the case of giving somebody the hand of a specific mood/feeling), or when we want to conceptualise the notion of participation in collective life as part of a group. The expression kula mkono kwa mkono (‘to eat hand with hand’) or kuunga mkono (‘to join one’s hand’) refer both to a physical or an empathetic/ intellectual participation symbolised by the hand gesture or the hand position. Hence, kuacha mkono (‘to remove one’s hand’), represents the extreme act of stopping participation in social life as part of a group, literally re­moving one’s hand, that metonymically stands for the person. The last section of this chapter has focussed on the use of mkono and mikono to metaphorically structure notions such as possession, dominion, control, authority. The analysis has eventually pointed out that such semantic networks end up by styling the body parts as a safe or a ­dangerous place. Kuwa na kitu mkononi/mikononi, that is ‘to have something in the hand(s)/arm(s)’ is a conceptualisation of possessing that thing and, logi­cally, of having dominion and control over it. In order to illustrate this phenomenon, some nominal constructions such as mkono mrefu (‘the long arm’), and

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verbal ­constructions such as kuwa mikononi, kuwa katika mikono or kuwa ndani ya mikono (‘to be in the hands/arms’); kuan­guk(i)a katika mikono (‘to fall in the hands/arms’); kuingia miko­noni (‘to enter in the hands/arms’) have been reviewed. These construc­tions refer to the state of being under somebody’s influence or authority, and convey, generally speaking, a negative nuance. However, also the opposite situation was investigated. In a different context, such body parts gain a fully positive nuance and, therefore, become symbols of protection and care. The analysis was based on the basic assumption of cognitive that cognition is mediated by our bodily experience. We tend to explain not only our bodies to ourselves, but also those as­pects that are not immediately related to a bodily experience using body-related references (Sharifian et al. 2008: 14). The identification of metaphors and metonymies has shown how our bodily experience is conceptualised in order to meet the needs of com­prehending the ways in which we see our­selves and the experiences we live through.

Appendix One: Swahili Sources from the University of Naples “L’Orientale” Corpus

Abdulla, M. S. 1977. Mke wangu. In Kinywa jumba la maneno, 48–57. Dar es Salaam / Nairobi / Kampala: Longman & B.B.C. Chachage, C. S. L. 2002. Makuadi wa soko huria. Dar es Salaam: E&D. Kamati ya Bunge. 1996. Muswada wa sheria wa kurekebisha sheria mbali mbali wa mwaka 1996 (The written laws miscellaneous amendments Act No. 17-1996). Kezilahabi, E. 1971. Rosa Mistika. Nairobi: East African Library Bu­reau. ———. 1974a. Kichomi. Nairobi: Heinemann. ———. 1974b. Kichwamaji. Dar es Salaam: East African Publishing House. ———. 1975. Dunia uwanja wa fujo. Dar es Salaam / Nairobi / Kam­pala: East African Library Bureau. ———. 1979. Gamba la nyoka. Dar es Salaam: East African Library Bureau. ———. 1988. Karibu ndani. Dar es Salaam: Dar es Salaam University Press. ———. 1990. Nagona. Dar es Salaam: Dar es Salaam University Press. ———. 1991. Mzingile. Dar es Salaam: Dar es Salaam University Press. ———. 2004. Mayai Waziri wa maradhi. In Mayai Waziri wa Maradhi na Hadithi Nyingine, ed. Kyallo Wadi Wamitila, 63–77. Nairobi: Focus. Kibao, A. S. 1975. Matatu ya thamani. Nairobi: Heinemann. Marzio, C., comp. 1992. Kigano cha nuru sanaa. Kisiki kya mkunazi. Maskini watoto wake saba na jini ya bahari. Mji wa kipumbavu. Mrathi. Rashidi. Shehe. In Narrativa orale Mtang’ata: Raccolta e mappatura. PhD diss., University of Naples “L’Orientale”.

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Ndalu, A. E., and K. G. King’ei. 1989. Kamusi ya methali za Kiswahili. Nairobi: East African Educational Publishers. Niemeier, S. 2003. Straight from the heart: metonymic and metaphorical explora­ tions.  In Metaphor and metonymy at the crossroads: A cognitive perspective, ed. A. Barcelona, 195–213. Berlin / New York: Walter de Gruyter. Peña Cervel, S. 2001. A Cognitive Approach to the Role of Body Parts in the Conceptualization of Emotion metaphors. Epos 17: 245–260. Sacleux, C. 1941. Dictionnaire Swahili-Français. Paris: Institut d’Ethnologie. Sharifian, F., R. Dirven, N. Yu, and S. Niemeier. 2008. Culture, body and language: Conceptualizations of internal body organs across cultures and languages: Berlin / New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Tognini-Bonelli, E. 2001. Corpus Linguistics at work. Amsterdam / Philadelphia: John Benjamins. TUKI. 2001. Kamusi ya Kiswahili-Kiingereza. Dar es Salaam: Institute of Kiswahili Research. ——— 2004. Kamusi ya Kiswahili Sanifu. Dar es Salaam / Nairobi: Oxford University Press. Werner, A. 1904. Note on terms used for ‘right hand’ and ‘left hand’ in the Bantu languages. Journal of the African Society 13: 112–116. Wierzbicka, A. 1999. Emotions Across Languages and Cultures. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Grammaticalization of Body-Part Terms in Mundabli Rebecca Voll Abstract The chapter describes the grammaticalization of body part terms in Mundabli (Cameroon: Yemne-Kimbi, a.k.a. Western Beboid). It has been shown for related languages (Heine 1991: 123–147) that spatial postpositions are commonly derived historically from body part nouns, and this also seems to be the case for Mundabli.  However, Mundabli body part terms also occur in a third category, which I call the ‘postnominal body part construction’. In this construction they behave differently from both nouns and postpositions regarding both their semantics and their syntactic behavior. In this chapter, I describe postnominal body part constructions and show what distinguishes body part terms in these from both nouns and postpositions. I conclude by suggesting that Postnominal body part constructions are an intermediate stage in the grammaticalization from nouns to spatial postpositions.

1 Introduction The aim of this paper is to describe the grammaticalization of body-part terms in Mundabli (Cameroon: Yemne-Kimbi, a.k.a. Western Beboid). It has been shown for related languages (Heine et al. 1991: 123–147) and also seems to be the case for Mundabli that spatial postpositions are commonly derived historically from body-part nouns. However, in Mundabli body-part terms also occur in a third category, which I call the ‘postnominal body-part construction’. In this construction they behave differently from nouns on the one hand and from postpositions on the other, regarding both their semantics and their syntactic behavior. In this paper, I will describe postnominal body-part constructions and show what distinguishes body-part terms in these from both nouns and postpositions. After a brief introduction to the language and its structure, I will first describe the structure of noun phrases and the use of postpositions in order to lay the foundation for comparing postnominal body-part constructions with both of them. I will then describe the structure of postnominal body-part constructions and reject the possibility that the body parts in these constructions © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi ��.��63/9789004274297_�15

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are arguments of the verb in some kind of external possession (or possessor raising) constructions. Having done this, I will compare the behavior of bodypart terms in postnominal body-part constructions with that of both nouns and postpositions by testing them for some of Heine’s criteria for nominality (Heine 1989 and Heine et al. 1991: 133) as well as for other language-specific criteria. The final section will summarize the findings and provide some conclusions drawn from the data. 2 Background Mundabli (ISO 639-3 code: boe)1 is a Yemne-Kimbi2 (Niger-Congo, Southern Bantoid) language spoken in Lower Fungom in the Northwest Province of Cameroon. With only around 500 speakers (Good et al. 2011), it is endangered by virtue of its small number of speakers alone, although it is currently relatively isolated from the extensive influence of Cameroon Pidgin English (ISO 639-3 code: wes), the local lingua franca, due to its remoteness and due to a general lack of infrastructure in the area. The data on which this article is based were collected during fieldwork with various consultants, conducted mainly in Wum and Mundabli (Northwest Province, close to the Ring road), in 2008, 2009 and 2012, as well as during various phone calls with one of my main informants. The data includes both natural language data and data from directed elicitation sessions. Previous work on Mundabli includes a survey of noun classes in all “Beboid” languages (Hombert 1980) and survey work done by SIL (Hamm et al. 2002 and Hamm 2002) and more recently a treatment of tone in the tense system (Voll 2013) and a grammatical overview of the languages of Lower Fungom (Good et al. 2011). There is no standardized orthography for Mundabli. The examples provided in this article are transcribed using my own evolving system.

1 While the Ethnologue (Lewis 2009) lists Mundabli, Mufu and Buu as varieties of a single language with the name Buu, “it seems probable that the linguistic variety spoken in Buu is a distinct, though closely related, language from the varieties spoken in Mundabli and Mufu.” (Good et al. 2011: 105). 2 The Yemne-Kimbi group of languages (formerly known as Western Beboid languages) is a recently suggested group based on geographical criteria, as there is neither evidence for the genealogical coherence of this grouping nor for its affiliation with what Good et al. (2011) recently proposed to rename Beboid (but which is still better known as Eastern Beboid).

286 3

Voll

Typological Sketch

In order to provide a somewhat more general picture, I will give some information on the structure of the language before proceeding to talk about grammaticalization. Mundabli has a predominantly isolating morphology. It has an elaborate noun class system which is comparable to those of Bantu languages, but noun class marking on the noun itself is not pervasive. When noun classes are marked on the noun, this is done by using segmental or tonal prefixes, stem alternations or stem changes. Nevertheless, most noun classes are marked by agreement only. Agreement is basically restricted to the noun phrase. While noun modifiers agree in noun class with the noun they modify, verbs do not show agreement. Noun phrases are head-initial, i.e. modifiers follow the noun they modify. Within a possessive phrase, the possessor generally follows the possessum. There is one exception to this order which may be relevant for the current issue. When the word wān ‘child’ occurs with a 1sg possessor, the order is possessor-possessum, with an independent pronoun, instead of the expected possessive pronoun representing the possessor.3 The unmarked constituent order in Mundabli is SVO, but VSO is also possible. Mundabli has both prepositions and postpositions, and while the group of postpositions is fairly large, there are only two prepositions. Verbs in Mundabli generally don’t take more than two direct arguments. Any additional (oblique) argument or an adverbial phrase is always headed by a preposition and/or a postposition within a pre- or postpositional phrase.4 Furthermore, Mundabli has four tone levels: low, mid, high and superhigh. 4

Non-Spatial Modification of Nouns

In order to show how body-part terms within postnominal body-part constructions differ from nouns (including body-part nouns which are identical in shape with the items under discussion), I will provide some examples for the structure of noun phrases, particularly of nominal modification. Apart from 3 In Buu, a closely related variety (see earlier footnote), this order plus the use of the independent pronoun form rather than the possessive pronoun is attested in all possessive phrases with a 1SG possessor. Comparable exceptions from the regular NP word order with 1SG (and 2SG) possessors have also been observed for other languages in the Grassfields area (Watters 2003: 248). 4 See Ameka (2003) for an argumentation based on similar languages in favor of the status of prepositions and postpositions as two separate word classes, distinct from each other as well as from nouns and verbs.

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the exceptions mentioned earlier, noun phrases are strictly head-initial. An example of a noun phrase consisting of a nominal head followed by several modifiers is given in (1).5 (1)

dzɔ̄ y-ɛ́n yī-fyi̋ŋ 4.houses 4-this 4-new ‘these three new houses’

y-ɔ́ 4-det

yi̋-tsɔ᷇ 4-three

The noun phrase is head-initial and the word order within the noun phrase is as follows: noun + possessive pronoun + demonstrative + adjective + determiner + numeral Body-part nouns outside of postnominal body-part constructions behave just like other nouns with respect to noun modification. In the possessive construction, if the possessor is represented by a full noun, the two nouns are simply juxtaposed without an associative particle intervening. The word order is then possessum+possessor, as shown in Examples (2), (3) and (4). (2)

(3)

(4)

bɔ̀ wān 7.bag 1.child ‘a child’s bag’

dzæ� ŋgɛ̀ 7.mouth 1.lizard ‘a lizard’s mouth’

wān ni̋ 1.child 1.mother ‘maternal sibling’/ ‘mother’s child’

When the possessor is pronominal, it takes the form of a possessive pronoun which agrees in noun class with the possessum (although see above for an exception). This construction is shown in Examples (5), (6) and (7). 5 The numbers in the glosses in (1) and all other examples indicate noun classes.

288 (5)

(6)

(7)

Voll

fo᷇ w-a̋ 5.cap 5-2sg:poss ‘your(sg.) cap’

dzæ� k-a̋ 7.mouth 7-2sg:poss ‘your(sg.) mouth’

wān w-ā 1.child 1-2sg:poss ‘your(sg.) child’

Examples (5), (6) and (7) further show that the same possessive construction is used with classic candidates for alienable possession (fo᷇ ‘cap’), with body parts (dzæ�  �6 ‘mouth’) as well as with kinship terms (wān ‘child’). Thus, there seems to be no distinction between alienable vs. inalienable possession. Possessive constructions as described above can be used for all kinds of nouns. 5 Postpositions Having shown what noun phrases look like, it is necessary to take a look at postpositions before comparing the postnominal body parts with both. Heine et al. (1991: 123–147) have shown that spatial adpositions in African languages are often derived from nouns via grammaticalization, and that body-part terms are the most common source. This also seems to be the case in Mundabli. Postpositions are grammaticalized forms which define a spatial domain on the referent of the noun they co-occur with. They have general meanings like IN, ON, UNDER, BEHIND, etc. and many of them derive historically from body-part nouns, while others likely come from landmark terms. 6 While the noun dzæ̋ ‘mouth’ has a super high tone in isolation, when occuring as possessum in the possessive construction, it has a high tone. This is a tone change that all nouns which have a super high tone in isolation undergo when they stand in initial position in the possessive construction, i.e. when they form the possessum.

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Although they have certain nominal characteristics, e.g. postpositional phrases can occur in subject position, they come closest to prototypical postpositions. The spatial location of an event or an object is usually encoded by a spatial postposition like mɨ̄ ‘in’, wɔ̄ ‘on’ etc. Direction is encoded by motion verbs which are part of serial verbal constructions. Postpositions are simply postposed to the nouns they co-occur with. Unlike nouns, they cannot themselves be modified or pluralized. Furthermore, certain pronouns (e.g. mɨ̄ ‘1SG’, wà ‘2SG’ and wù ‘3SG’) bear a high tone when they are headed by a postposition. This can be seen in example (8). The 1SG pronoun, which has a high tone in example (8), has a mid tone in other contexts. The tone of full noun phrases in a postpositional phrase is the same as in isolation. The tonal processes are relevant to our issue as they are also at work in postnominal body-part constructions. Examples for the use of postpositions are provided in (8)–(11). (8)

(9)

(10)

(11)

wē w-ɔ́ ba̋ n mɨ́ ŋgɔ̄ 5.sun 5-det shine(B) 1sg upon ‘The sun is shining on me strongly.’

wù nyēn kūo 3sg hide(A) enter(C) ‘He hid under a rock.’

ɪ̋ dzɛ́ loc 5.rock

a̋ ADVLZ

kɪ̀-lì ADJVZ-strong

dzō UNDER

bɔ̋ gān yə́ ŋgàŋ wɔ́, ŋkwɪ̄n 3PL go(A) climb(C) 3.hill 3-det 1.mountain ‘They went up on that hill . . . that mountain.’

mbi̋ dɨ̋ (ɪ̋) sʊ̄ ŋ 6a.palm_wine be(B) (loc) 9.calabash ‘There is palm wine in the calabash.’

w-ɔ̄ wɔ̄ 1-det ON

y-ɔ̄ mɨ̄ 9-det in

Although I marked its optionality only in the elicited example in (11), the use of the locative preposition ɪ̋ in addition to a postposition is possible but not obligatory in all examples in (8)–(11).

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Some of the postpositions are identical in phonological form with nouns representing body parts (e.g., dzə̄m ‘behind’, ‘back’ and yū ‘after’, ‘buttocks’, ‘anus’) as can be seen in example (12). (12)

6

gbɔ̄ dɨ̋ wú dzə̄m 3.house be(B) 3SG BEHIND ‘There is a house behind him.’

Postnominal Body-Part Constructions

Having described the behavior and the semantics of nouns and postpositions, it is now time to look at examples of postnominal body-part constructions. While the behavior of body-part terms in postnominal body-part constructions is similar to that of postpositions in some respects and to that of nouns in others, they are different enough from both to be assigned to a third category. After showing some examples of postnominal body-part constructions, I will compare the behavior of body-part terms within them with that of postpositions and nouns using criteria for nominality adapted from Heine et al. (1991: 133) as well as language-specific criteria. Examples of postnominal body-part constructions are provided in examples (13)–(18). (13)

(14)

(15)

kə̋ wù kə̀ bāŋ dɔ̄ w-ɔ́ wú dzæ� , ni̋ kwe᷇ when 3SG PST3 lock(B) 5.beans 5-det 3SG mouth.IN mother return_bush(C) ‘When she had put the bean into her mouth, [her] mother returned from the farm.’

tábà w-ɛ̄n dɨ̋ mɔ̀ 1.cigarette 1-DEM. PROX be(B) 1.man ‘This cigarette is in the man’s mouth.’

wù tṳ̋ fō̤ wú 3SG let_grow(B) 6.hair 3SG ‘She let the hair on her head grow.’

w-ɔ̄ 1-DET

fɔ̄ head.ON

dzæ� mouth.IN

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(16)

(17)

(18)

ntsɨ̀ŋ f-ɔ́ dɨ̋ kpé w-ɔ̄ 19.bead_necklace 19-DET be(B) 1.woman 1-DET ‘The bead necklace is [hanging] around the woman’s neck.’

kpé w-ɔ̄ nàn nʃʊ́ ŋ 1.woman 1-det wear(A) 19.necklace ‘The woman is wearing a necklace around her neck.’

bɔ̋ kū gbɪ᷆ (ɪ̋) 3pl tie(A) 3.rope (loc) ‘They tied a rope around my waist.’

mɨ́ 1sg

wú 3SG

kʊ́ ŋ neck.AROUND

kʊ́ ŋ neck.AROUND

bān waist.AROUNd

While all examples found in natural texts contain a pronominal body part owner, it is possible to elicit examples in which the owner is represented by a full noun phrase, as in Examples (14) and (16) which were elicited using the “Bowped” picture series (Bowerman & Pederson 1992). In Examples (13)– (18), body parts occur in the same position as postpositions, i.e. they follow the noun phrase referring to their possessor without morphological marking, rather than preceding it within a possessive phrase, as one would expect if they behaved like nouns. Thus, the behavior of body parts in this construction differs from nouns’ behavior in two aspects: (i) the pronoun used is not the possessive pronoun, but the independent pronoun and (ii) the order is reversed, so that the noun phrase referring to the owner of the body part comes first, followed by the body-part term. Just like postpositions, body-part terms in postnominal body-part constructions cannot be modified further, while the equivalent body-part terms can be modified when they occur in other contexts. Furthermore, what distinguishes body-part terms within postnominal bodypart constructions from nouns and makes them similar to postpositions is the fact that they cannot function on their own (i.e. without the possessor) as subject of the verb. Body-part terms whose semantics, in this context, include both the body part and the specific space on the body part, cannot occur in subject position without their possessors. The same is the case for postpositions which cannot occur in subject position outside the postpositional phrase. Another aspect of body-part terms in postnominal body-part constructions which groups them with postpositions rather than nouns is that they cannot be pluralized. Even if the context indicates that it is the plural of a body part

292

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which is being referred to, as in Example (20) where the body-part term occurs in its singular form tʃʊ̋ ŋ ‘7.ear’, ‘in the ear(s)’ rather than tʃɔ̋ m ‘8.ears’. However, there is one exception I am aware of: fɔ̄ ‘5.head’, ‘on upper end’, can occur in its plural form fá, even within a postnominal body-part construction. While body parts within postnominal body-part constructions cannot occur on their own as the subject of the verb (as has been shown above), the complete phrase, consisting of the body part preceded by its possessor, can occur as subject of the verb, as Example (19) shows. While this is a feature crosslinguistically more typical of noun phrases, in Mundabli the same is also true for postpositional phrases, showing that even postpositions have some nominal properties. (19)

mɨ́ŋ dzæ̋ wɔ̋ m fɨ̄ 1sg mouth.IN be_dry(B) pass(B) ‘The inside of my mouth is really dry.’

The shape of the pronoun in example (19) differs slightly from its form in other contexts. When a postnominal body-part construction occurs in subject position, the pronoun always ends in a nasal. Table 1 summarizes the criteria listed above, most of which are adapted versions of Heine et al.’s (1991: 133) criteria for nominality, and compares body parts within postnominal body-part constructions with nouns and postpositions. Table 1

Comparison of body-part terms in postnominal body-part constructions with nouns and postpositions Noun

Possessive pronoun Order: Possessum – Possessor Modifiability Independent subject Pluralization Complete phrase subject

+ + + + + +

Body part in postnominal bodypart construction – – – – – +

Postposition

– – – – – +

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The patterns in Table 1 show that body-part terms in postnominal body-part constructions behave differently from nouns. It further suggests that they are practically identical with postpositions. Another language internal criterion which could not be integrated in Table 1, but which makes postnominal bodypart constructions look even more like postpositional phrases is that certain pronouns have a high tone when they occur in initial position in these constructions. This can be seen in Examples 14–18 above. While the 3sg pronoun wù has a low tone in other contexts, and the 1sg pronoun mɨ̄ usually has a mid tone, in these examples, in which they occur in the postnominal body-part construction, both have a high tone. The same is the case for pronouns followed by postpositions. Nevertheless, there are at least two factors which distinguish body parts in postnominal constructions from postpositions, but which could not be integrated into Table 1, namely their semantic restriction and the fact that they can be replaced by a possessive construction followed by a postposition. The semantics of body-part terms in postnominal body-part constructions combine the meaning of the original noun with a specific spatial domain (e.g., ‘on top’, ‘inside’) on the referent of that noun (i.e. the relevant body part). While nouns generally do not include the spatial domain in their semantics, postpositions do not usually refer to the referent of the noun (i.e. in this case the body part) from which they are derived. Thus, Example (20) (with a postnominal body-part construction) contrasts with (21) (with a postposition). (20)

(21)

mfa̋ m bi̋ wú tʃʊ̋ ŋ 6a.blood exit(B) 3sg ear.IN ‘Blood came out from INSIDE her ear(s).’

mfa̋ m bi̋ tʃʊ̋ ŋ k-i̋ 6a.blood exit(B) 7.ear 7-3SG.POSS ‘Blood came out somewhere ON her ear.’

ŋgɔ̀ UPON

While in the Postnominal body-part construction in Example (20), tʃʊ̋ ŋ refers specifically to the spatial domain inside the ear, in Example (21) tʃʊ̋ ŋ simply means ‘ear’, and the spatial domain is specified by the postposition ŋgɔ̀ ‘on’, ‘by’. The effect of this is that postnominal body-part constructions are quite restricted as to the possessors which can co-occur with the body part. Their use is restricted to animates and things which are perceived to possess an equivalent of the relevant body part, e.g. ntʃē ‘armpit’ can only occur with humans,

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while fɔ̄ ‘head’ can occur with ‘house’ or ‘mountain’, but not with flat objects like ‘book’. Examples of inanimate nominals in postnominal body-part constructions are given in (22) and (23). (22)

(23)

bɔ̋ kù gbī kpān 3PL tie(A) 3.rope 3.tree ‘They tied the rope around the tree.’

w-ɔ́ 3-DET

kʊ́ ŋ neck.AROUND

wù ɥē ŋgī ɪ̋ gbɔ̄ 3SG pour(A) 6a.water LOC 3.house ‘He poured water onto [the top of] the house.’

w-ɔ́ 3-DET

fɔ̄ head.ON

Such restrictions are a matter of degree. While some postpositions are also restricted regarding the noun with which they can co-occur, their restrictions are weaker, i.e. they are not usually restricted to animates, as are some of the body-part terms in postnominal body-part constructions but rather to objects of a certain shape. Furthermore, another property which distinguishes postnominal body-part constructions from postpositional phrases, is the fact that a postnominal bodypart construction can always be reformulated using a possessive construction with the body part in the function of a possessum as shown in the examples in (24) and (25). The resulting possessive construction lacks the locative semantics though, and a spatial postposition, which comes with the optional locative marker ɪ̋, is necessary in order to express location on the possessed body part. (24)

(25)

ntsǔŋkwɪ́n w-ɔ̄ ʃɛ̄ wū kɔ̄ ʃī wú 1.owl 1-that intend(A) 3SG hold(B) descend(A) 3SG ‘The owl wanted to land on his head.’

fɔ̄ head.ON

ntsǔŋkwɪ́n w-ɔ̄ ʃɛ̄ wū kɔ̄ ʃī fɔ̄ w-ű wɔ̄ 1.owl 1-that intend(A) 3SG hold(B) descend 5.head 5-3SG:POSS ON ‘The owl wanted to land on his head.’

A look at the distribution of different body parts across the three categories, i.e. nouns, postnominal body-part constructions and body parts in postpositions, reveals certain distributional patterns. Table 2 contains a (non-exhaustive) list

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of body-part terms. It shows which body parts occur as nouns in postnominal body-part constructions and as postpositions.7 Table 2

Body-part terms and their occurrence in the different constructions

BP terms Gloss

Postnominal Gloss forms

Postpositions

Gloss

kē

ka̋ n

‘in hand(s)’

ka̋ n

dzə̄m fɔ̄ kʊ́ ŋ

‘hand, finger(s)’ ‘back’ ‘head’ ‘neck’

dzə̄m fɔ̄ kʊ́ ŋ

dzə̄m7 fɔ̄ kʊ́ ŋ

ya᷆

‘stomach’

ya᷆

yū dzæ�  � wʊ̋ ŋ tʃʊ̋ ŋ kɛ́

yū dzæ�  �  wʊ́ ŋ tʃʊ́ ŋ kɛ́

bān

‘buttocks’ ‘mouth’ ‘nose’ ‘ears’ ‘back of head’ ‘waist’

ntʃé tsǎn kpɨ́n kɛ̋ nyű bīè kű bān

‘armpit’ ‘arm’ ‘elbow’ ‘leg’ ‘knee’ ‘foot’ ‘belly’ ‘hips’

ntʃé

‘on back’ ‘on head’ ‘around neck’ ‘in stomach’ ‘in anus’ ‘in mouth’ ‘in nose’ ‘in ears’ ‘on back of head’ ‘around waist’ ‘in armpit’

‘in possession’, ‘under control’ ‘behind’ ‘on top’ ‘around’

bān

ya᷆ yū

‘inside’ (nonhollow object) ‘after’

7 While dzə̄m and yū are both glossed as behind in Table 2, the postpositional use of dzə̄m expresses that sth. is located behind another object while yū in the postpositional use means ‘behind’ in the sense of following another person (or animal).

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As Table 2 shows, all body-part terms which occur as postpositions also occur in postnominal body-part constructions, but not the other way around. Thus, we can formulate the following implicational hierarchy: postposition > body part in postnominal body-part construction > noun, implying that any body-part term which occurs in one of the constructions listed in the hierarchy also occurs in the constructions to its right (i.e. if a body part occurs as postposition, it also occurs in a postnominal body-part construction and as noun). 7 Conclusion I have demonstrated above that the behavior of body-part terms in postnominal body-part constructions differs from both that of nouns and of postpositions and that this construction has to be acknowledged as a third construction. My hypothesis is that this construction arose through grammaticalization of body part nouns, but it is as yet unclear whether it is an intermediate stage in the development of spatial postpositions or a separate development. However, the distributional pattern in Table 2 could indicate that this is an intermediate step in the development of postpositions. There is not a single body part which occurs as a postposition but cannot occur in a postnominal body-part construction and every body part which occurs in a postnominal body-part construction also exists as noun of the same or a very similar phonological shape. If the direction of the development were either the other way around, i.e. from postpositions to body parts in postnominal body-part constructions and from these to nouns, or if there was no connection between the different stages, one would expect a different distribution than the one found in Table 2. While the above has set forth body-part terms in postnominal body-part constructions as a third category alongside nouns and postpositions, other issues that need attention are the co-existence of two constructions which can express the same semantic content and the difference in use between these two constructions. As I pointed out earlier, a postnominal body-part construction can always be paraphrased by use of a postpositional phrase which contains as dependent a possessive construction (in which the body-part term occurs as possessum) and is headed by a spatial postposition. Further research is necessary in order to find out what determines the preference of either a postnominal body-part construction or a possessive phrase which is embedded in

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a postpositional phrase, in a specific context. Finding out why a postnominal body-part construction is preferred in certain contexts may also reveal other interesting aspects of grammaticalization. Abbreviations 1sg first person singular 1pl first person plural 2sg second person singular 2pl second person plural 3sg third person singular 3pl third person plural 1–19(a) noun classes (A)–(C) verb tone classes ADJVZ adjectivizer ADVLZ adverbializer bp body part consec consecutive DET determiner emph emphasis hab habitual loc locative O object poss possessive pro pronoun PST3 remote past S subject V verb References Ameka, Felix K., 2003. Prepositions and postpositions in Ewe (Gbe): empirical and theoretical considerations. In: Sauzet, P. & Zibri-Hertz, A. (eds.), Typologie des langues d’afrique & universaux de la grammaire, Volume II Benue-kwa, Wolof. Paris: L’Harmattan: 41–67. Bowerman, Melissa & Eric Pederson, 1992. Topological relations picture series. In: Stephen C. Levinson (ed.), Space stimuli kit 1.2: November 1992, 51. Nijmegen: Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics.

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Good, Jeff , J. Lovegren, J. P. Mvee, C. Nguanguep, R. Voll, and P. Di Carlo, 2011. The languages of the Lower Fungom region of Cameroon: Grammatical overview. Africana Linguistica (Vol. 17): 101–164. Hamm, Cameron, 2002. Beboid language family of Cameroon and Nigeria: Location and genetic classification. SIL Electronic Survey Reports 2002–017. Hamm, Cameron, J. Diller, K. Jordan-Diller, and F. Assako a Tiati, 2002. A rapid appraisal survey of Western Beboid languages (Menchum division, northwest province). SIL Electronic Survey Reports, 014. Heine, Bernd, 1989. Adpositions in African languages. Linguistique africaine 2: 77–127. Heine, Bernd, Ulrike Claudi, and Friederike Hünnemeyer. 1991. Grammaticalization: a conceptual framework. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Hombert, Jean-Marie, 1980. Noun classes of the Beboid languages. In: Larry M. Hyman (ed.), Noun classes in the Grassfields Bantu borderland. Southern California Occasional Papers in Linguistics, 8. Los Angeles: University of Southern California: 83–98. Lewis, M. Paul (ed.), 2009. Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Sixteenth edition. Dallas, Tex.: SIL International. Online version: http://www.ethnologue.com/. Voll, Rebecca, 2013. Tonal variation in the tense system of Mundabli, Western Beboid. (Bantoid, Cameroon). In: Matthias Brenzinger and Anne-Maria Fehn (eds.) Proceedings of the 6th World Congress of African Linguistics, Cologne, 17–21 August 2009. Rüdiger Köppe Verlag: 533–543. Watters, John R., 2003. Grassfields Bantu. In: Derek Nurse and Gérard Philippson (eds.). The Bantu languages. pages 225–256. Routledge language family series 4. New York: Routledge.

Whomever It Concerns—Notions of Control, Initiation and Affectedness in Expressions of Body-Centred Activities in Mbembe Doris Richter genannt Kemmermann Abstract Body-centred activities in Mbembe (Benue-Congo, Central Jukunoid) are defined rather broadly in the present chapter to include physical processes as well as cognition, perception and emotion. These can be referred to by different classes of verbs. Certain verbs are specific to one body-centred activity, while others can describe different activities or be used in other contexts. Depending on the class of the verb as well as on the meaning expressed in the respective context the arguments are realised in different ways. For example, verbs which can be used in contexts other than body-centred activities often require an explicit reference to the body of the referent performing or being affected by the activity. The realisations of the subject and object arguments of the verbs depend on factors like initiation and control on part of the subject referent and affectedness of the object referent. While these notions are generally attested in the Mbembe language, they are highly relevant in the domain of body-centred activities. Moreover, animacy and topic play a role. Thus expressions of body-centred activities in Mbembe illustrate especially clearly how different factors interact to yield the various syntactic constructions attested in the language.

1 Introduction Mbembe is a Central Jukunoid (Benue-Congo) language spoken in the borderland between Nigeria and Cameroon.1 It is a mainly analytic, isolating language with little bound morphology. Since there are hardly any morphological 1 The present study is based on the so-called ‘Upper Mbembe’ variety, one of the two dialect areas within Cameroon. The other variety in Cameroon is called ‘Lower Mbembe’. These dialect areas further divide into sub-varieties, which show a number of lexical, phonological and grammatical differences. The different varieties form a continuum, whereby villages closer to the border of another dialect area show properties of that area. The differences will not be mentioned in detail here, since they do not affect the topic described.

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means in the language to derive new meanings or grammatical categories, other strategies are used in the language. This is especially relevant for verbs, which cannot be productively derived from other word classes. Within the word class verb derivation is quite restricted as well. There is, for example, no productive means to increase or decrease the valency of a verb. Instead, new meanings are derived by the combination of two or more verbs in serial verb constructions or by the combination of a verb with a specific object argument in so-called verb-noun-collocations. Moreover, many verbs in the language are used in different types of syntactic constructions without any morphological changes. Thus argument structure in Mbembe depends on a number of different factors, for example the different types of syntactic constructions a verb can be used in, the event structure, the semantics of the verbs and the context. All of these interact with one another yielding the different types of sentences attested in the language. Nevertheless, it is assumed that verbs do have a basic event structure encoded in their semantics which is reflected in their predominant use in one type of syntactic construction. Since neither the verb nor its core arguments are morphologically marked as such in a sentence, they have to be defined syntactically. Constituent order is the main means to define the subject and object arguments. The basic word order in Mbembe is SV/AVO—thus the subject is the noun phrase preceding the verb and the object the one that follows it. (1)

a)

b)

ŋwāsyô yí yā child impftv come ‘The child is coming.’ bō ðī ~ zī vē 3pl:s eat meat ‘They eat meat.’

By contrast, peripheral arguments are usually overtly marked, for example by the general preposition ŋɛ̀ (2.a) or the comitative/instrumental preposition wō/ō ‘with’ (2.b). (2)

a)

b)

vrū tō kū ŋɛ̀ tō-í fruit tree fall:sg adp tree-loc ‘The fruit fell from the tree.’ ē tʃī gē wō fɛ̄ndʒī 3sg:s cut 3sg:o:nh with axe ‘S/he cuts it with an axe.’

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The referent of the subject argument is usually that referent that initiates or controls the activity, while the referent of the object argument is the one affected by it (cf. Dixon 2010: 116). Since inanimate referents are hardly ever conceived of as being able to control or initiate an activity, animate, or more specifically human referents, are most common as subject arguments. Inanimate referents only function as subject arguments when the animate referent is not in control of the activity or event or when no animate referent is involved, for example in natural phenomena. In contrast, the object argument can be either animate or inanimate. The association of the positions relative to the verb by notions of control and initiation versus affectedness is relevant for all types of events. However, it surfaces especially clearly in expressions of body-centred activities, since these seem to form a continuum from controllable activities to non-controllable ones. 2

Body-Centred Activities

Body-centred activities are understood here to include physical processes as well as processes and states related to perception, cognition and emotion.2 Certain body-centred activities are expressed by verbs which are specific for the activity in question, while in other cases the verbs can be used in other contexts as well. Some verbs then require an explicit reference to the body of the human referent. The realisation of the core arguments, especially for the latter verbs, depends highly on the notions of control and initiation on part of the subject and affectedness of the object. The higher the degree of control a referent has over an activity, the more likely it is that s/he is used in subject position of the verb. The lower the degree of control and the higher the degree of affectedness, the more likely the referent is realised as object argument of the verb. Or vice versa, the position of the human referent within these clauses indicates whether s/he is in control of something or rather affected by it. Thus, as described above and especially true for body-centred activities, there is a close interaction between the classes of verbs, their context of use, the semantic roles of their core arguments, how the latter are realised and whether they make reference to the body or not.

2 These different domains do not seem to be clearly distinguished. Expressions referring to any of these can be combined in complex ways in Mbembe. This requires further investigation which is beyond the scope of the present study.

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The different classes of verbs and the different types of constructions will be outlined in the following. 2.1 Verbs Specific to Body-Centred Activities Verbs which describe one specific body-centred activity most commonly refer to physical processes, perception or cognition, but are also attested in a number of expressions of emotion. While verbs describing physical processes usually occur in intransitive constructions (3.a) or take the medium as object argument (3.b), verbs of perception and cognition take the impression or thought as object argument (3.c). (3)

a)

b)

c)

ē yí ŋɔ̀ pwâ 3sg:s impftv breathe ‘S/he is breathing.’ ē yí fyɔ̂ 3sg:s impftv cough ‘S/he is coughing.’ ē vè gē 3sg:s see 3sg:o:nh ‘S/he sees it.’

é-fyɔ̂ nom-cough

The human referent is always in subject position of the verb, since s/he is understood as controlling and initiating the activity. For most of these bodycentred activities, this is also true in causative contexts, i.e. when the activity is initiated by a different referent. Explicit causative constructions usually require a double predication with the verb mbyâ ‘make’ and a second verb that refers to the activity that is caused. The subject argument of mbyâ ‘make’ is the causer and the object argument is the referent asked to perform an activity. The caused activity is then embedded in a complement clause introduced by lɛ̀ ‘that’ and takes the causee as subject argument, since s/he is the one initiating that activity. (4)

ē mbyâ ŋɛ̄ 3sg:s make 1sg:o ‘S/he made me (that I) go.’

lɛ̀ that

n̄ =dɔ̀ 1sg:s=go

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In the case of body-centred activities, however, the causative constructions are switch-function serial verb constructions.3 Comparable to the causative constructions above, the causer is the subject argument of mbyâ ‘make’, while the causee is the object argument of it and the subject argument of the caused activity. But in contrast to the other causative constructions, the caused activity is not realised as a complement clause and the referent is thus not mentioned twice in the sentence. Moreover, the impression that causes the body-centred activity, for example the emotion ‘fear’ in example (5.b), is not realised as object argument although the verb sē ‘fear’ is usually used in transitive constructions as in (5.a).4 (5)

a)

b)

ŋwāsyô yí sē vō tʃù child impftv fear wind rain ‘The child fears the storm.’ dʒù-gē yā mbyâ wā exit-3sg:poss past make people ‘His appearance frightened the people.’

sē fear

Verbs that refer to a specific body-centred activity take the animate referent as subject argument—even in cases where it is explicitly expressed that the activity is not initiated by her/him. However, if the speaker wants to highlight that the animate referent is affected by the activity described, s/he is shifted to object argument position after the verb. This will be described in detail in 2.4. below. 2.2 The Verb of Perception pɔ́ ‘experience’ Other verbs can refer to different body-centred activities. This is mainly attested with verbs of perception and emotion. An example is the perceptive verb pɔ́ , which is probably best translated rather generally as ‘experience’. In contrast to the verbs above, it can refer to different body-centred activities and thus can take the perceiver either as subject or object argument. If the verb refers to perceptions like ‘hear’ or ‘smell’, the perceiver is realised as subject argument and the impression as object argument. These

3 Switch-function serial verb constructions are rather rare in Mbembe and restricted to specific contexts like the one describe here. 4 It is a common strategy in Mbembe to avoid repetitions of arguments which have already been mentioned in the clause or which are known from the preceding discourse.

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perceptions are understood as not being voluntarily initiated by the perceiver, but neither do they directly affect her/him. (6)

a)

b)

wā mbrì pɔ́ gē people all experience 3sg:o:nh ‘Everybody hears it.’ bō pɔ́ -wà émyâ ényê 3pl:s experience-cons odour excrements ‘They (then) smell the (smell of) excrements.’

However, in the description of perceptions that do affect the perceiver to a higher degree, s/he is realised as object argument of the verb pɔ́ . The impression is still the trigger of the perception as was also the case in examples (6.a) and (6.b). But in examples (7.a) and (7.b) it seems to exert a higher degree of initiation since it is the subject argument. (7)

a)

b)

dʒwɔ̂ yí mbyâ pɔ́ song impftv make experience ‘The song makes my ears ache.’ sé pɔ́ gē head experience 3sg:o ‘Her/his head aches.’

ŋɛ̄ 1sg:o

tʃwâ ears

In explicit causative constructions with mbyâ ‘make’ the perceiver is then, in contrast to the causative constructions described above, the object argument of both verbs in the clause, which follow each other in a serial verb construction. If the perception affects a specific body part of the animate referent, it follows this referent as an additional argument (cf. 7.a).5 Moreover, constructions with only the perceptive verb pɔ́ ‘experience’ can have a causative reading if the perceiver is in object function. S/he has to be understood as being affected by the perception, which is rather initiated by the impression. The latter is thus the subject argument. 2.3 Qualitative Verbs The realisation of the perceiver/experiencer as object argument in causative constructions has been attested for verbs used in the expression of emotions 5 These double object constructions will be discussed in detail further below.

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as well. Emotions are usually not expressed by verbs specific to that context, but rather by verbs which are predominantly attested in other contexts. Most of these verbs are either stative or inchoative verbs, which form a rather large class in Mbembe. Both classes of verbs describe a property or state of the animate referent and are called qualitative verbs here. To be used to describe emotions, the verbs have to make explicit reference to the body of the experiencer. This is done by the addition of the noun θyɛ̃ ̂ ~ syɛ̂. This noun has been variously translated as ‘mind’, ‘heart’, or ‘the thing in the middle’ by the Mbembe speakers. It does, however, not refer to a physical body part (though it is quite likely related diachronically to the word for ‘heart’ (cf. Proto-Central-Jukunoid * kíǹ (Shimizu 1980)), but rather to a psychological entity or to the inside of the body as a whole in an abstract sense, i.e. without implying a specific location within the body.6 The noun θyɛ̃ ̂ ~ syɛ̂ ‘mind’ has the semantic role of medium in these expressions of emotions. One example of a verb that has been attested in expressions of emotions— but also in other contexts—is the stative verb pí ‘lack’ or ‘have not’. In its basic use, it occurs in intransitive constructions and takes a person lacking something as subject argument. The referent lacked is realised as a peripheral argument introduced by wō/ō ‘with’. (8)

a)

b)

bō pí ō nārā 3pl:s lack with mothers ‘They don’t have mothers.’ ē pí ō kɔ̄ bɔ̄ 3sg:s lack with money ‘S/he lacks money.’

If the verb describes emotions like ‘anger’, ‘hatred’ or ‘sadness’, it has to make explicit reference to the body of the experiencer with the noun θyɛ̃ ̂ ~ syɛ̂ ‘mind’. If this feeling is projected onto someone or something, that referent occurs directly after the verb, but before the noun θyɛ̃ ̂ ~ syɛ̂ ‘mind’ resulting in a double object construction without further modifications of the verb itself. The sentence in (9.) is then translated as ‘S/he hates me.’.

6 Mbembe thus does not locate emotions in a specific physical body part, for example liver or stomach, as has been described for other African languages, for example by Dimmendaal (2002) for Nilotic languages or Ameka (2002) for Ewe.

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ē 3sg:s a) b)

pí ŋɛ̄ syɛ̂ lack 1sg:o mind ‘S/he hates me.’ ‘S/he makes me angry.’

Moreover, the sentence can be interpreted in a causative sense. In that case, the subject referent is understood as having caused the object referent to feel ‘anger’, ‘sadness’ or ‘hatred’ and the sentence should rather be translated as ‘S/he makes me angry’. Although it is no longer the subject referent who is the experiencer, there is no change in the structure of the sentence. Comparable to the constructions described above, the experiencer is realised in object position, since s/he is not controlling the emotion, but rather affected by it. However, while the examples in (7.) allow for only one interpretation, since there is only one animate referent, the example in (9.) with two animate referents is ambiguous. The meaning of the sentence can thus only be inferred from the context. Such ambiguity can be avoided by the use of an explicit causative construction with the verb mbyâ ‘make’. In these constructions—again comparable to the constructions with the verb pɔ́ ‘experience’ (cf. 7.a)—the experiencer functions as object argument of both verbs, mbyâ ‘make’ and pí ‘lack’, while the initiator of the emotion is the subject argument of both verbs. (10)

ē yā mbyâ 3sg:s past make ‘S/he made me angry.’

pí lack

ŋɛ̄ 1sg:o

syɛ̂ mind

Another verb that shows similar constructions is the inchoative verb sɔ̄ ‘become good’. It usually does not refer to emotions, but rather describes a property of the referent. In these contexts it can either be used predicatively (11.a) or it can be nominalised and then used as an attributive modifier of a noun (11.b). (11)

a)

b)

tā sɔ̄ -tē house bec_good-stat ‘The house is good.’ tā á-sɔ̄ -sɔ̄ house partcpl-bec_good-red ‘good house’

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The verb only refers to emotions when explicit reference is made to the body of the experiencer with the noun θyɛ̃ ̂ ~ syɛ̂ ‘mind’. In contrast to the verb pí ‘lack’ described above, it is mainly used in expressions of emotions that have been initiated by another referent and not by the experiencer, which is then again realised in object position directly after the verb.7 (12)

a)

b)

bō yā vè brē á-sɔ̄ bō syɛ̂ mū 3pl:s past see place rel-bec_good 3pl:o mind neg ‘They have not seen a place which makes them happy.’ ébɔ̀ dɔ̀ àfí yā pɔ́ byé dʒé-gē hú ē yā time devil past experience things dance-3sg:poss def:sg 3sg:s past sɔ̄ gē syɛ̂ gbà-wā bec_good 3sg:o mind bec_much-adv ‘When the devil heard her instruments, it made him very happy.’

The qualitative verbs are not attested in the corpus with the noun θyɛ̃ ̂ ~ syɛ̂ ‘mind’ as (sole) object argument, i.e. when the emotion is not projected onto someone or caused by someone. In that case, the noun θyɛ̃ ̂ ~ syɛ̂ ‘mind’ combines with the experiencer in a possessive construction that functions as subject argument. (13)

a)

b)

syɛ̂ dʒàfī ké sɔ̄ mind rabbit proxfut bec_good ‘The rabbit will become happy.’ syɛ̂-gē pí mind-3sg:poss lacks ‘S/he is/becomes angry.’

This possessive construction seems to express a lower degree of initiation on part of the experiencer. If, for example, the emotion of ‘anger’ is described as a process that is initiated by the experiencer, this is expressed by an affect verb rather than by a qualitative verb.

7 Explicit causative constructions with the verb mbyâ ‘make’ have not been attested for this verb.

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ē fyě syɛ̂ 3sg:s take mind ‘S/he becomes angry.’

This assumption is further supported by the fact that the possessive construction is also attested with certain cognitive processes that are understood as never being in full control or actively initiated by the cogitator, for example ‘forget’. (15)

syɛ̂-ŋɛ̄ ŋwɛ̀-yí mind-1sg:poss bec_full-pftv ‘I forgot your name.’

wō with

zré-wō name-2sg:poss

Thus, the inchoative and stative verbs take the animate referent as subject argument whenever s/he is initiating or controlling the body-centred activity, although different degrees of initiation and control can be indicated by varying constructions. If another referent has to be understood as the initiator of the activity, the experiencer is instead realised as object argument. 2.4 The Verb of Emotion nɛ̄ Generally, verbs that are describing specific body-centred activities do not make explicit reference to the body of the experiencer. There is, however, one verb in Mbembe—nɛ̄—that always expresses emotions, but which can either make explicit reference to the body of the experiencer or not. If it is used without reference to the body, it describes emotions like ‘happiness’ or ‘love’. In contrast, if it takes the noun θyɛ̃ ̂ ~ syɛ̂ ‘mind’ as object argument, it refers to emotions like ‘worry’. It is thus glossed here very generally as ‘feel’. If the verb nɛ̄ is used without reference to the body, it takes the experiencer as subject argument. The stimulus can optionally be added as a peripheral argument introduced by wō/ō ‘with’. The verb thus occurs mainly in intransitive sentences. (16)

a)

b)

ē nɛ̄ 3sg:s feel ‘S/he becomes happy.’ ē nɛ̄-tē ō 3sg:s feel-stat with ‘S/he loves me.’

mī 1sg:indp

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This simple verb nɛ̄ is never attested in causative contexts in the corpus. If these emotions have been initiated by a different referent this is expressed by the verb sɔ̄ ‘become good’ as described above. Moreover, the verb nɛ̄ combines with the noun θyɛ̃ ̂ ~ syɛ̂ ‘mind’ as object argument. In these examples, the emotion described is ‘worry’. The experiencer is the subject argument of the verb whenever s/he is understood as initiating the emotion, while the stimulus is realised with a reason clause or phrase introduced by ké. Thus, the object argument is not the stimulus but rather the medium. (17)

ɲí nɛ̄ syɛ̂ ké 1pl:s feel mind about ‘We are worried about it.’

gē 3sg:o:nh

With this meaning the verb can also be used in causative expressions, which are comparable in structure to the ones above: the causer of the emotion occurs in subject position, while the experiencer is the object argument after the verb. The medium is still realised as object argument but shifted one position further back in the clause. Again, a double object construction is attested with a verb that also occurs in intransitive and transitive constructions. (18)

ē nɛ̄ wā 3sg:s feel people ‘S/he made people worry.’

syɛ̂ mind

The verb nɛ̄ is exceptional in the language, since it is specific to the context of emotion, but nevertheless takes the noun θyɛ̃ ̂ ~ syɛ̂ ‘mind’ as object argument. In contrast to the qualitative verbs this does not change the context in which the verb is used—it still refers to an emotion—but it refers to a different emotion. 2.4 Affect Verbs and Motion-Direction Verbs Certain body-centred activities seem to be uncontrollable, since they never take the animate referent as subject argument. Instead s/he is always realised as object argument, which indicates that s/he is the referent most affected by the activity. These uncontrollable body-centred activities are attested in all domains, i.e. they can be physical processes as well as cognitions, perceptions and emotions. They are never described by verbs specific to body-centred activities. Rather affect verbs and motion-direction verbs are employed, which are usually used outside this context.

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a)

b)

c)

d)

éθɛ̃̀ yí dʒù gē sweat impftv exit 3sg:o ‘S/he is sweating.’ mbɔ̄ yí tɔ́ hunger/thirst impftv do ‘S/he is hungry/thirsty.’ éwɛ̄ yā mbū gē shame past take 3sg:o ‘S/he was ashamed.’ ndɛ̄ kà gē tʃĩ̀ dream enter 3sg:o ‘S/he dreamt in the night.’

gē 3sg:o

night

The inanimate referents in subject position are either bodily excretions or abstract nouns describing the body-centred activity. These nouns could be understood as nominalised forms of verbs. However, no verbs that refer to these body-centred activities are attested in the corpus. Nevertheless, nominalised forms of verbs referring to body-centred activities as subjects of affect verbs or direction-motion verbs are rather common in the corpus. These constructions usually express a higher degree of affectedness of the animate referent (cf. 20.b and 20.d), in contrast to those where s/he is realised as subject argument of a verb specific to the state (cf. 20.a and 20c). (20)

a)

b)

c)

d)

ē yí 3sg:s impftv ‘He is sick.’ gbé drí sickness body ‘He is sick.’ ē yí 3sg:s impftv ‘He is happy.’ á-nɛ́-tē nom-feel-stat ‘He is happy.’

gbé be_sick tɔ́ do

gē 3sg:o

nɛ́-tē feel-stat kpɔ́ -tē catch-stat

gē 3sg:o

As the sentence-initial subject position is also the primary topic position in Mbembe, it could also be assumed that these constructions are topic construc-

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tions. The body-centred activity is then of greater interest than the referent affected and thus realised in subject position of the verb. The animate referent is shifted to the object position directly after the verb, which is a secondary topic position. A shift of arguments to this position as a topicalisation strategy is also attested in the language. However, in contrast to the examples above, the animate referent is not shifted from subject position to object position, but rather a possessive relation between a body part and its possessor are realised in different ways in the object position of verbs depending on whether the possessor is in control of the activity or not. This is mainly attested with bodycentred activities that physically affect a body part of an animate human referent.8 These are usually expressed with affect verbs or motion-direction verbs. Moreover, it has also been attested with perceptions and emotions (cf. examples 7.a), 9., 10. and 12. above). In these examples, possessive constructions of a body part and its animate possessor are only allowed in object position of a verb if the animate referent is the same as the subject of the sentence, i.e. whenever the referent that is affected is also controlling or initiating the activity. (21)

a)

b)

ŋwāsyô hú ké dí-gē child def:sg cut self-3sg:poss ‘The child cut itself.’ ŋwāsyô gbɛ̄ bwō-gē kúkūrū-í child catch hands-3sg:poss back-loc ‘The child holds its hands at the back.’

If, however, the subject referent and the possessor of the body part are not the same, a possessive construction cannot be used in object position of the verb—this is considered ungrammatical by the speakers. In that case, a process that has been called possessor promotion (Hyman 1977), possessor ascension (Fox 1981) or verbal attraction (amongst others Serzisko 1984) sets in. It involves a shift from an adnominal, possessive relation of two nouns to an adverbal relation, in which the possessum and the possessor no longer occur in a relation to each other but rather in a relation to the verb of the clause (cf. Claudi & Serzisko 1985: 150/151). 8 Non-human referents are again excluded from this discussion, since possessive constructions of non-human referents and their body parts as object arguments of verbs are realised quite regularly.

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The split of the possessive relation into an adverbal relation is realized in Mbembe in two different ways. Either the possessor occurs in object position directly after the verb, while the body part is realized with a locative phrase and thus functions as peripheral argument of the verb. (22)

a)

b)

fīdɛ̀ dʒɛ̀ ŋɛ̄ ŋ̀ krúbū-yí rat bite 1sg:o finger-loc ‘The rat bit my finger.’ zɔ̀ gbé gē ndū-yí water reach 3sg:o knees-loc ‘The water reached (up to) her/his knees.’

Or the possessor and its body part occur in a double object construction. In this case, the possessor is realized in direct post-verbal position, while the body part follows its possessor as an additional argument of the verb. In these examples, the verbs take two object arguments without further modifications, irrespective of whether they are basically intransitive like ŋwɛ̀ ‘creep’ or transitive like fá ‘shave’. (23)

a)

b)

ē fá gē zrí 3sg:s shave 3sg:o hair ‘S/he¹ shaves her/his² hair.’ bū yí ŋwɛ̀ gē thing impftv creep 3sg:o ‘Something is creeping on his body.’

gbɔ́ body

An interesting observation is that the different-subject human referent is preferred in object position directly after the verb outside a possessive relation, while the same-subject referent can occur in a possessive relation to its body part. Although possessor promotion usually occurs with affect verbs and direction-motion verbs, it is neither the semantics of the verbs nor their argument structure that trigger the split of the possessive construction. It should rather be understood the other way round: the syntactic construction indicates that the referent in direct post-verbal position is the one most affected by the activity. This has been suggested for other languages as well (cf. Claudi & Serzisko 1985: 145). Moreover, as regards physical affectedness, it is more important to know which body part is affected when the human referent affects her-/himself, while it is more important to know who is affected when it is a

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different referent—thus the difference between same-subject and differentsubject constructions. Therefore, these constructions also function as topic constructions. As has been mentioned above, the position directly after the verb in Mbembe is a secondary topic position and the shift of the human possessor to that position topicalises her/him in contrast to the body part. 3 Summary As has been illustrated, expressions of body-centred activities in Mbembe are influenced in their realisation by different factors. One important factor is the semantics of the verbs. While certain verbs refer to only one specific bodycentred activity, other verbs can be used for different body-centred activities or used outside that context. Associated with the different domains of use of the verb are specific semantic roles, which influence the realisation of the arguments of the verbs. Depending on the meaning the speaker wants to express, verbs can occur in intransitive, transitive or ditransitive sentences without modifications of the verb itself. The definitions of subject and object arguments in Mbembe by notions of initiation and control of the subject referent and affectedness of the object referent surface in different constructions in expressions of body-centred activities. While the animate referent involved in the body-centred activity is usually the one initiating or controlling it, this can be altered whenever the speaker wants to highlight either that s/he did not initiate the activity or that the referent is most affected by the activity. A further important role in the expression of body-centred activities seems to be whether a relation to the body has to be overtly expressed or not. In the former case, certain deviations can be found between constructions in which the affected animate referent is also the one initiating it and those constructions in which s/he is not. Another factor involved in the expressions of body-centred activities is topic. Thus, several different factors influence these constructions. Further in-depth studies are needed to fully understand expressions of bodycentred activities in Mbembe, especially in those cases where verbs of different semantic classes combine to describe new meanings. Acknowledgements The data presented in this chapter are based on fieldwork carried out in Cameroon between 2007–2010 within the project “Nominal categorisation and Seinsart in African languages” of the Institute for African Studies, University of

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Cologne, funded by the German research foundation (DFG). The author thanks the anonymous reviewers for their comments on this paper. References Ameka, Felix K. 2002. Cultural scripting of body parts for emotions: On ‘jealousy’ and related emotions in Ewe. Pragmatics and Cognition, 10(1–2), 27–55. Claudi, Ulrike & Fritz Serzisko. 1985. ‘Possession in Dizi: Inalienable or not?’ Journal of African Languages and Linguistics 7,2: 131–154. Dimmendaal, Gerrit J. 2002. Colourful psi’s sleep furiously: Depicting emotional states in some African languages. Pragmatics and Cognition, 10(1–2), 57–83. Dixon, R. M. W. 2010. Basic Linguistic Theory, Vol.2: Grammatical topics. Oxford: OUP. Fox, Barbara. 1981. Body part syntax: Towards a universal characterization. Studies in Language 5: 323–342. Hyman, Larry. 1977. The syntax of body parts. In: Byarushengo, E., A Duranti & L.  Hyman (eds.). Haya grammatical structure. (Southern California Occasional Papers in Linguistics, 6.) Los Angeles: University of Southern California. pp. 99–117. Serzisko, Fritz. 1984. Der Ausdruck von Possessivität im Somali. Tübingen: Gunther Narr. Shimizu, Kiyoshi. 1980. Comparative Jukunoid, Vol. 2, Pt.2. Wien: Afro-Pub.

Abbreviations 1,2,3 1st, 2nd, 3rd person Adp adposition adv adverbialiser def definite article demprox proximate demonstrative article impftv imperfective indp independent pronoun loc locative marker neg negation marker nh non-human nom nominalizer o object partcpl participle past past tense pl plural poss possessive

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proxfut proximate future tense red reduplication rel relative marker s subject sg singular stat stativizer

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Sexual, Impure, Vulgar: An Analysis of the Intimate Body-Part Terms in Egyptian Arabic Magdalena Zawrotna Abstract The words used to name the intimate body parts are taboo in Egyptian Arabic due to their association with two “forbidden” domains: sexuality and excretion. It results in what we can describe as a double stigmatisation. The terms for the private parts embody some of the negative characteristics of the things they denote. Vulgarisation of these terms is a cultural and social consequence of this fact. This is why the discourse of anatomical parts associated with sexuality involves a strong emotional reaction and a specific nonverbal code. The intimate part terms may be perceived as vulgar and replaced by euphemisms. The main focus of this work is on the analysis of the relation sexual = impure = vulgar as a conceptual base for vulgarisms. The paper explores the following question: Where does the difference between male and female body parts in the ability to abuse and wield influence come from?

1

Intimate Body-Part Terms

The problem of vulgarization of the terms for intimate body parts in the Egyptian Arabic (ECA) is a phenomenon often observed in other languages and is an example of certain broader tendencies springing from human psychology. Terms used to name the intimate body parts are taboo as they are associated with two forbidden domains: sexuality and excretion. It results in what we can describe as a double stigmatization, mentally involving shame and timidity and a more tangible sense of impurity. Words used to name the private parts embody some of the negative characteristics of the things they denote. This is why the discourse of anatomical parts associated with sexuality involves a strong emotional reaction and a specific nonverbal code (e.g. hushed voice). Vulgarization of a term is a cultural and social consequence of the negative perception of what the term denotes. The terms that I would like to discuss in this paper are: (1) kuss (2) zibb (3) zubr © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi ��.��63/9789004274297_�17

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(1) refers to the female reproductive organ, while (2) and (3) refer to the male ones. These three are described as “coarse” in Said Badawi and Martin Hind’s dictionary of Egyptian Colloquial Arabic. Translated, (1) is highly obscene; the English equivalent of “cunt”. In comparison (2) and (3) are both translated as “penis” or “cock”. While “penis” is a neutral word that can have a medical usage, “cock” is a colloquial and rather common expression with minimal vulgar characteristics. Neither (2) nor (3) are used abusively as a means of verbal aggression. Unlike using (1) there is no possibility of offending anybody by calling them (2) or (3). The neutral status of the two lexemes is confirmed by native speakers of Egyptian Arabic. It is important to highlight that in English there is a more offensive expression ‘’dick”, meaning a male reproductive organ, but it was not used to translate either (2) or (3) in the aforementioned dictionary. The word “dick” has no lexical equivalent in Egyptian Arabic. In ECA1 only female intimate body-part names can be used to verbally abuse other people. (1) is the basic and most common aggressive expression and can be used in many different altercations, eliciting each time a strong emotional reaction. Moreover, the lexeme appears to undergo a gradual desemantization and in the past it was a derivational basis for a plethora of insulting expressions such as: (4) kassis ‘to kiss arse’ (coarse) (5) kassīs ‘arse–kisser’ (coarse) (6) mikassāti ‘arse kisser’ (coarse) (7) mitkassis (coarse)–passive participle of kassis The expression in (1) appears most of the times with a nominal attribute ummak, i.e. as kuss ummak ‘your mother’s cunt’2 and clearly insults the recipient’s mother, unlike a similar expression in Polish kurwa mać (lit. ‘whore mother’) where the semantics of the expression seem to be pushed into the background, mostly because mać as an obsolete word is no longer used except in this particular context. The collocation of (1) and ummak is so obvious that the two words are often written as one, kusummak. However, without ummak, (1) can also be quite offensive, (it is enough to use only (1) for example: ya kuss (you cunt). There is also the tendency to combine different abusive expressions in order to elicit a stronger effect. 1 ECA = Egyptian Colloquial Arabic. 2 Most of the examples are translated literally.

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The great number of abusive words derived from the root (1) indicates the perlocutionary power of this expression. Although there is hardly any such expression coming from the roots (2) or (3), these words are considered vulgar by Egyptian society due to their meaning and they are highly embarrassing and awkward. Nevertheless, they definitely have no power in offending anybody in an argument. The question to explore is: Where does the difference between male and female body parts in the ability to abuse and wield influence come from? It appears that it is somehow related to inequality in the degree of tabooization of the male and female bodies. In order to explain this issue it is necessary to refer to the Egyptian culture on the basis of which I will attempt to outline the difference between male and female body in terms of social functioning. Justification of some of my claims will be based on Stanisław Widłak’s theoretical analysis of the taboo. As an addition I will quote the results of the interviews I carried out in Egypt in a group of 50 young Egyptians concerning the usage and valuation of body-related terms. The study aimed at pragmatic analysis of the subject in order to understand the linguistic behavior of Arabs. I will also use the methods of cognitive linguistics to understand the conceptual basis, the perception and the valuation of body- and sex-related terms. The linguistic material presented in this article was collected in Egypt during the scholarship period (2008–2009) and three additional visits between 2009–2012 (individual field research). 2

Tabooization of the Female Intimate Body Parts

It is necessary to start by reflecting on the cult of virginity which is characteristic to most cultures of the world. It provides a basis for numerous everyday practices like the covering of the female body. In many cultures nudity is identified with the lack of protection, defenselessness and vulnerability. As an object of taboo, the female body needs protection, that is, to be covered. Another important issue is the belief that women are endowed with an inexhaustible sexual energy which can lead to unwanted sexual intercourse, hence the practice of female genital mutilation (FGM) largely performed among Egyptians in order to reduce the risk of disgrace. Egyptians practice male circumcision as well but for ritual and hygiene reasons, whereas female circumcision is concerned with moral purity. From this perspective, it is possible to state that the two practices bearing the same name in Arabic (ḫitān) are in fact not the same thing. The customary name for circumcision in ECA is ṭahāra (purity) in con-

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trast to the whole range of sexual behavior identified with filth (wisḫa = filthy woman). The name wisiḫ (filthy) cannot be attributed to a man on account of the lack of metaphoric category “sexual = filthy” that would apply to men. Therefore, the symbolic filth is a metaphorical scheme only effective when applied to females. Since a woman’s virginity is considered to be an important and carefully guarded value in Islamic culture, her body is subject to strict social control. It is ḥarām (forbidden, sacrosanct), which precisely describes the meaning of the word “taboo”. A man’s sphere of intimacy seems to be limited to the genitals while a woman’s is much broader and sometimes covers the entire body, as well as parts of clothing, especially the undergarments. Words, such as those below, are considered indecent and saying them loudly indicates low social status, low class background or simply a lack of manners on the part of a speaker: (8) sintiyāna ‘bra’ (9) kulōt ‘panties’ In comparison with them, the words naming male underwear are completely neutral: (10) slib ‘underpants’ (11) bokser ‘shorts’ The gender segregation commonly associated with Islamic culture also operates at the level of language. The language of men and women differs with respect to what can be said and how and is regulated by the rules of politeness, tact and often timidity. While speaking about the body and things related to it men and women use different codes as a means of a camouflage. Below I will briefly outline the results of a study conducted among 50 young Egyptians concerning relatively new English loan words used to refer to things strictly related to female intimate body parts: (12) (13) (14) (15) (16)

swit ‘sugar for depilation’ brawn ‘epilator’ silkibīl ‘epilator’ biryid ‘period’ olwees ‘sanitary pad’

One of the questions was: “Do you know these words and do you use them?” The study revealed that most of those who use such words are women, e.g.:

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(15): 100% women, 43% men (12): 84% women, 10% men While only one woman admitted she didn’t know (15) there was a great number of men to whom this and other examined words were unknown. 17–30% of men said they knew these words but did not use them because of modesty and timidity. The borrowings presented here are euphemisms; they aim to mitigate the effect of the nomina propria which are almost completely excluded from usage due to the linguistic taboo in operation. This holds particularly true with a number of dialectal expressions which are so embarrassing that they are almost completely forbidden: (17) dawra šahriya ‘period’ (18) fōṭa ṣaḥḥīya ‘sanitary pad’ As noted by Kaplan (1955: 552): The dual vocabulary for sexual subject-matters, to be found in many cultures besides our own, is a device to preserve the conventions. ‘The fourletter word is a scapegoat which allows the rest of the language to be free of sin.’ The use of a foreign language (especially Latin) for questionable passages conveys a detached point of view which leaves the conventions undisturbed. More important, the foreignness restricts the work to welleducated elite, whose conformity is not in doubt or who may, indeed, feel privileged to stand above the mores altogether. In daily speech all sorts of euphemisms are used, for example: menstruation = il-bitā‘ ‘the thingumajig’, ‘the what’s-its-name’. It is possible to say: (19) ‘andik il-bitā‘? ‘do you have your period?’ or: (20) ṣaḥbiti gatli in-naharda ‘my friend visited me today’ (21) hiyya ‘andaha ẓurūf ‘she’s going through difficult times or special circumstances’ (22) ana kibirt, ana kibira in-naharda ‘I matured’ The taboo of the intimate body parts manifests itself in the language in two different ways: silence and euphemization. Some types of content are not

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expressed in any verbal way at least as far as a certain social class is concerned, which in turn shows us the social stratification reflected in the language. The body is a taboo subject for the middle and working class members but it is a less risqué topic for the upper middle class (private university graduates) and for what we can describe as the lowest social class (criminals, drug addicts etc.). Although people usually refer to the intimate body parts by simply calling them “intimate body parts” or “reproductive organs”, there are other means of conveying that meaning, for example using metaphor, metonymy or a foreign language. In modern Egypt switching between ECA and English is widely practised when there is a need to mitigate the effect of the words upon an interlocutor. One of the respondents reported that during a visit to a gynecologist she had been asked: kān fī sexual intercourse ma beenku? ‘Have you had sexual intercourse?’. Obviously, the doctor would not have asked this question if he had not judged the patient well-educated. Other words related to the intimate body parts are French borrowings: (23) a. bibbī ‘pee, urine’ b. yi‘mil bibbī ‘to pee, to urinate’ (24) a. kakkā ‘a poo, faeces’ b. yi‘mil kakkā ‘to poo, defecate’ However, they represent a different sort of taboo (excretion and uncleanliness). Although those words are foreign borrowings they have become deeply rooted in the ECA lexicon and lost ipso facto their gentle tone. Rather than being considered rude, these words are viewed as admissible on condition that a conversation takes place between an adult and a child. It appears that physiological functions are not taboo for children as they are unable to control them. Adults, however, must face the fact that there are no neutral expressions to name these functions. Words such as those listed below are considered to be vulgar: (25) šaḫḫ / yišuḫḫ ‘to piss, to urinate’ (26) ’aḥḥ / yi’iḥḥ ‘to urinate’ Borrowings from the MSA are too formal and too academic: (27) bāl / yabūl ‘to urinate’ (28) itbawwal / yitbawwal ‘to urinate’ (29) itbarraz / yitbarraz ‘to defecate’

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(25) and (26) are the examples of ”secondary” tabooization of words that primarily served as euphemisms but with time have become equally awkward due to the process of tabooization. This group also includes other words, especially names for items of underwear. Unlike English borrowings: bra ‘bra’ and anderwer ‘underwear’, French words: kulōt ‘panties’ and sintiyāna ‘bra’ are considered embarrassing and shameful and therefore using them requires at least some consituational factors (conversation among girls, no men in the proximity, hushed voice). At this point it is crucial to remember that no such characteristics are attributed to men’s slib and bokser. Będkowska-Kopczyk argues (quoting Eliade) that generally the object of a taboo is a thing / person / activity that possesses some sort of power (Będkowska-Kopczyk, 2009). No doubt, the ability to bear children may be regarded as a power. It is worth mentioning here that the negative connotations of menstruation and blood imagery affect the perception of female intimate body parts as well. 3

The Sphere of Sexuality

When it comes to intimate body-part names it is possible to section off two different levels of the tabooization. The first level (represented by (2) and (3)) is when a word becomes indecent due to the highly culturally embarrassing part of life it refers to. A connotation with sex and procreation makes people avoid using such words. The other level of tabooization, represented by (1), is when a word is not only embarrassing, but also has the ability to soil and tarnish, destroying the honor of an opponent. According M. Peisert (2004), the perlocutionary effect of an expression depends on the strength of the taboo it breaks. In the case of the woman’s body it breaks the strongest taboo of Islamic culture. Also the excretory function is of great significance. Since both male and female organs serve to urinate, they are viewed as impure. However, in the case of women, menstruation creates an additional sullying factor, as it is a highly forbidden topic in Islamic culture. Menstrual secretions make a woman ritually impure and lead to the perception that everything in contact with her is defiled. The obvious reason for this negative characteristic is its sexual and excretory function, both of which can be attributed to the derogatory uses of these terms. In this paragraph I will try to examine the tarnishing power of sexuality as a result of social assessment and collective perceptions towards sexual activities.

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The relation ‘sex = filth’ can be inferred from such euphemisms for sex as: ’illit el-’adab ‘lack of manners’. To broaden our perspective it is necessary to examine other vulgarisms based in the domain of sexuality. The basic verb used to abuse others is nāk / yinīk ‘to fuck’ as in the examples: (30) a. hanīkak tu’ūl ay ‘I’ll fuck you till you moan b. haddīk tirinn ‘I’ll make you scream’ (euphemism) A speaker destroys the honor and social position of his opponent by verbalizing a sexual act towards them. Therefore it is possible to state that the act of sex has got a sullying and tarnishing effect which is derived from the tabooization of the sexual act, to which magical power was attributed in the past. The profanation of such sacrosanct human activities is a source of strong emotional reaction. In Egyptian society there is a clear relation between sexuality, impurity and vulgarity, which provides a conceptual base for many vulgarisms. Deliberate breaking of the sexual taboo may affect the targeted party by generating an influx of negative emotions. The reference to the sexuality is a powerful tool as evidenced by the word nīk (verbal noun) which is often used as an intensifier (compare:’išṭa nīk ‘fucking cool’). Other examples of Egyptian vulgarisms semantically rooted in the domain of sexuality include: (31) (32) (33) (34) (35) (36) (37)

šarmūṭa ‘whore’ ‘āhira ‘slut’ mūmis ‘slut, hussy, hooker’3 mitnāka ‘fucked’ hanīk ummak ‘I’ll fuck your mother’ ya bint il-mara il-qazira ‘you are a daughter of filthy woman’ uḫtak zānya ‘your sister is a slut’

These examples illustrate that the vast majority of such lexemes aim at insulting women rather than men. The most abusive profanity for a man is being called mi‘arraṣ ‘pimp’, someone who sells women (which would include his mother, wife or daughter). The honor of a man as a citizen, husband and father 3 Due to the contextualized nature of profanity in both languages it is difficult to find direct translations.

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depends on his ability to maintain the family’s good name, that is, the chastity of the family’s female members. Thus this insult, suggesting he is inept or has failed in performing his duties, is highly abusive: (38) yalla abūk mi‘arraṣ ‘ala ahl beetu ‘your father whores out the women in your family’ Calling a man (1) is highly insulting as referring to him with a slang term for the female reproductive organ is a blow to his honor because it means degradation in social hierarchy. A comparison to a woman is abusive for a man, as it undermines his masculinity: (39) yalla zibbak mabyiw’afš ‘your penis does not go up’ (40) ya ḫawal ‘you sissy’ (41) yalla ‘āmil zayy el-bint ‘you are like a girl’ In the vernacular of Egyptian youth, man’s sexual potency plays an important role in linguistic communication. In the group of three intimate body part names discussed in this article, two stages of tabooization were preliminarily distinguished: words that are embarrassing and shameful and words that, in addition to these characteristics, are vulgar and have a tarnishing power. In the latter situation a speaker exploits a taboo word in order to insult an interlocutor. Allan and Burridge (2006: 10) argue that in this situation the taboo aspect of a word is in some way set aside: “Our position is that at the time the so-called taboo is flouted it does not function as a taboo for the perpetrator (. . .) when the violation is deliberate, the taboo is not merely ineffectual but inoperative”. According to this statement the speaker is aware of the proscription on the use of the word and deliberately breaches it which must entail a sanction in the form of social exclusion. It behoves us to add that the effect of vulgarisms upon Egyptian interlocutor’s ears is stronger than it is in Western culture. Foreign swear words are never translated into Arabic e.g. in movie subtitles (they are substituted with the word: la‘na ‘a swear word’ and they hardly ever appear in writing. Unlike in many European and American countries, even mild swear words like tīẓ ‘ass’ are forbidden in Egypt. The most common way of insulting someone is to question the chastity of their mother. Referring to the intimate body parts of any female relatives insults him according to the Arabic understanding of male honor (šaraf ), which can

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only be guaranteed by the untarnished reputation of the women in his family. But it happens extremely rarely that the addressee’s father is insulted: (42) abūk mitnāk ‘your father gets fucked’4 To summarize it is necessary to reiterate the following relation: sexual = impure = vulgar; this is only true when it comes to a woman’s sexuality because the chastity of women is of substantial cultural value. In the case of a man it is his financial efficiency that really counts. The evidence for this statement comes from other cultures as well: The second observation prompted by the extract of discourse reproduced above concerns the appearance in it of the terms ‘slapper’ and ‘slut’ (. . .) a ‘slut’ is a woman who sleeps around. ‘Slapper’ has achieved wide currency among British English speakers more recently, and refers to a promiscuous woman of vulgar appearance and behaviour. These terms, and related ones like ‘tart’ and ‘slag’, have no masculine equivalents (Cameron and Kulick, 2003: 32). De Klerk draws our attention to the disproportionate number of abusive expressions applicable to men and women: Greer (1971) noted the growth in pejorative terms applicable to women in English, particularly in the semantic areas of illicit/casual sex, food, pretty toy words, and animal terms. Lawrence (1974) noted the same trend of more contemptuous terms that derogate females rather than males. Legman (1968), in an analysis of dirty jokes, also noted the preponderance of lexical sexism against females (see also Miller & Swift 1978; Schulz 1975; Stanley 1975) (De Klerk, 1992: 277–289). The sexual purity of a woman and unadulterated conduct dictate the reputation of not only a woman but all the female and male members of her family. This reputation may be sullied easily by the suggestion that a woman defies socially accepted codes of conduct in any way. Therefore the usage of (1a) is 4 However, according to what the Egyptians state, the distinction between mother and father is not always operative. Such swear words as: yil‘an dīn ummak (let the religion of your mother be cursed) and yil‘an dīn abūk (let the religion of your father be cursed) are just the same in terms of the level of offensiveness. This is due to the fact, that neither mother nor father is abused by them, but their religion.

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in fact calling an opponent’s mother a prostitute. The term is examined by a journalist L. L. Wynn: Sharmouta, the term that my Egyptian friends from all different classes tended to translate as “prostitute” (but which might be better rendered as “whore”), is a highly pejorative term, and sharply contested. Egyptian women tend to resist the term (. . .) because they understand how easily it can be used to criticize any woman who defies social codes of female respectability in one way or another. It operates at the intersection of female sexuality and independence. As such, prostitution in Egypt is only partly about sex and money (Wynn, 2010). According to this passage “prostitute” is a woman who defies social codes of conduct in any way (a woman who smokes, laughs loudly, lives alone, etc.). Her social value is seen in terms of sexuality—in the Egyptian culture being a “prostitute” is the lowest stage of social degradation. Similar findings are seen in (Henley, 1987: 4): A woman’s sex is commonly treated as if it is the most salient characteristic of her being, but this is not the case for males. This situation is the basis of much of the defining of women and it underlies much of the deprecation. Sexual insult is overwhelmingly applied to women: Stanley (1975), in researching terms for sexual promiscuity, found 220 terms for a sexually promiscuous woman but only 22 for a sexually promiscuous man.

4

Sexual = Impure = Vulgar

The sexual domain provides a conceptual basis for assaults due to its tabooization. Quoting Żelvis, Maria Peisert writes: In the realm of human values during the course of the development of civilization there have been two opposite tendencies. First, was the sacralization of everything to do with fertility and the reproductive cycle. The second, was the profanation of such symbolism with a kind of subconscious sacred and protective attitude toward it. The profanation of sacrum (. . .) leads to the change of a sacred word into an invective without causing change in its emotional character (Peisert, 2004: 44).

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The author also quotes Bakhtin’s theory of carnivalization that manifests by transferring sacred values into the domain of “bodily lower stratum”. Maria Peisert explains, “experiencing catharsis” is close to Bakhtin’s purification by heading into “the lower” which means giving up socially accepted cultural and ethical norms and deliberately breaking the taboo of sacred words related to procreation, and so called “bodily lower stratum” (Peisert, 2004: 155). It is crucial to remember that the relation sexual = impure = vulgar holds true only when concerning women. Referring to a man’s sexuality has no simi­ lar perlocutionary effect. In Egypt, there is a proverb “Ir-rāgil- mayi‘ayyibūš ḥāga (ġeer gību)”. It means that none of a man’s faults disgrace him (except for his financial status). Without fail, maligning the honor of a man’s mother or other close female relatives will cause him to lose face. Maria Peisert’s explanation of this problem is that it springs from the historical relations in the society when women could not represent themselves in public situations (e.g. in court). There was always a man speaking and acting on her behalf so her indignity influenced the male members of her family—her father, husband, brother (Peisert, 2004: 80). 5

The Mother Figure

According to Maria Peisert (2004), people abuse others by the profanation of human sanctities, among other things God, birth and mother. A verbal attack on people is based on abusing the reverence of one’s mother, i.e. by referring to her genitals in the expression (1a). It is not the only example of such a reference; there are also: (43) alwād wisḫa ‘children of a filthy woman’ (44) ibn šarmūṭa ‘a son of a bitch’ (45) bint ‘āhira ‘daughter of a whore’ (46) ibn il-qaḥba ‘son of a prostitute’ (47) ibn il-labwa ‘son of a lioness’ These expressions are also found in other languages; English: son of a bitch, Spanish: hijo de puta, French: enfant de putain, Italian: figlio di puttana, Croatian: kurvin sin. In fact, the word “mother” (umm) in certain context can express negative emotions, e.g: ya umm iš-šuġl! ‘this damned work!’. At this point, it is natural to ask: why “mother”? Where does the abusiveness of (the word) “mother” come from?

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There are a few theories that attempt to explain this phenomenon. The first one presented here states that suggesting loose morals of one’s mother means in fact that a speaker questions his social background as in the expression nīkat ummak ‘your mother gets fucked’ along with the names of the places where the action would take place: (48) nīkat ummak a. fi l-ḥāra ‘in the neighbourhood’ b. fi š-šāri‘ ‘in the streets’ c. fi šu’a’ ‘in the flats’ In Egyptian culture like in many other cultures, a father’s name historically was a means of conveying values and, therefore, questioning the paternity by suggesting the mother’s lack of fidelity socially degrades an opponent. Calling somebody (44) is in fact an accusation, calling into question his background, and historically was (in certain countries of Europe) liable to punishment if not confirmed or withdrawn immediately (Będkowska-Kopczyk, 2009). In the case of all the examples mentioned above it is possible to state that, as a result of mother’s promiscuity, the actual father of an addressee remains unknown. There are, however, other examples, like (35) in which the speaker puts himself in the position of the “perpetrator”. The scheme is probably most productive in the Slavonic languages: Slovenian: jebem ti mater, Serbian: jebem ti majku, hence the explanation to this issue is provided by researchers working on this language area, e.g. by Będkowska-Kopczyk. The author states (quoting Neżmah and Zelanin) that having sex with an individual who the opponent cannot have sex with due to the incest taboo (e.g. a mother, a sister, etc.), guarantees he will be forced into a lower level of social hierarchy. In this way a speaker attributes himself a role of father or other person higher in the social hierarchy5. This theory explains the lack of abusive expressions based on sexual intercourse with one’s daughter—such expressions would put a speaker in the position of son-in-law, which is lower in the social hierarchy. According to the author, words related to intercourse with the addressee’s mother are a means of domination and power especially in patriarchal societies (Będkowska-Kopczyk, 2009).

5 To accept this theory we have to assume that the person who has sexual intercourse with addressee’s mother is in fact the speaker.

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6 Diglossia Previous examples explain the cultural basis that attributes abusive functions to the terms naming the female’s intimate body parts. To complete the picture it is important to locate the discussed vulgar forms in the sociolinguistic map of Egypt. Specifically, the phenomenon of diglossia, a situation in which two language varieties are used in typical daily life, needs to be explored. The situation of diglossia in a speech community was first described by Ferguson (1959) who defined it as a coexistence of two different language varieties called H (high) and L (low) which function to some extent in a complementary distribution. The prestigious H is used in formal situations such as: political speech, print media, television (information programs), literature, science, etc. L (dialect, colloquial) is a medium of everyday spoken and written (e.g. in the Internet) interactions. However, despite this convenient dichotomy, there are different views about the linguistic situation in Egypt. Many contemporary researchers believe that it should be discussed in terms of a continuum. According to some scholars, on the scale stretching from MSA6 to ECA there are many different varieties of Arabic (e.g. Badawi suggests five). It is true that there are hardly any examples of “pure” ECA or MSA usage. Moreover, currently, the linguistic situation is additionally complicated by a strong position of English as a means of instruction in highly prestigious private schools and universities. A comparison of Modern Standard Arabic and Colloquial Egyptian suggests that within these two language varieties exists a difference with respect to the valuation of the intimate body parts and their names. What seems to be neutral in MSA is more likely to undergo evaluation according to the social trends in the Colloquial Egyptian. Thus the terms for intimate parts may be perceived as vulgar and replaced by euphemisms. The MSA has lexemes such as: farğ ‘vagina’ and qaḍīb ‘penis’ neither of which is associated with a negative valuation. The neutrality of these words is due to the automatic scientific and medical connotation. Nevertheless in normal everyday life they are completely excluded. In modern day Egyptian language there is hardly the possibility of discussing problems related to reproductive organs without sounding too extreme; either too scientific or too vulgar. Hence, such problems remain unspoken. Moreover, we observe a gradual desemantization of (1) which appears to be losing its function of naming the female reproductive organ in favor of functioning as an insult.

6 MSA = Modern Standard Arabic.

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7 Summary In conclusion I would like to emphasize some important parts of this article: 1. 2.

3.

The tabooization of intimate body part names in ECA is a result of double stigmatization arising from their affiliation with the two forbidden domains of sexuality and excretion. Although the terms for male and female private parts are taboo, they differ in the degree of tabooization and thereby result in a difference in their communicative functions. The words for the male organ (2) and (3) are awkward and using them may lead to an embarrassing situation. Sometimes it can help to identify the social status of a speaker since a decent citizen would not use them in public. (1) has great offensive power and is used only when a speaker intentionally violates the social norms and aims at destroying the honor of his opponent in a symbolic way. One of the most common ways of offending someone is to question his mother’s conduct, which may be regarded as questioning his bloodline.

Finally, I would like point out that field research on vulgarisms in Egyptian Arabic is sparse. Moreover, complications arise due to the sensitivity of the subject which makes it hard to find respondents open-minded enough to discuss such matters. Nevertheless, in the era of globalization the need for such research becomes increasingly vital. Understanding the cultural and social valuation of foreign words is what makes us comprehend the valuation of things and ideas. This should be a key issue not only for the freely moving citizens of the world, but also for intercultural communication and international policy theorists. This kind of knowledge should also be included in the linguistic competency of a learner of ECA. References Allan, Keith, Burridge, Kate. Forbidden Words. Taboo and the Censorship of Language. Cambridge, 2006. Badawi, El-Said. Mustawayāt al-luġa al-‘arabiya al-mu‘āṣira fi miṣr. [The Levels of Modern Standard Arabic in Egypt] Al-qahira, 1973. Będkowska-Kopczyk, Anna. „Przekleństwa jako przykład łamania tabu (na przykładzie języka polskiego i słoweńskiego oraz innych języków słowiańskich)” [Vulgarisms as

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an Example of Breaking the Taboo (On the Example of Polish and Slovanian), in: Dąbrowska, Anna (ed.). Język a kultura. Tabu w języku i kulturze. Wrocław, 2009. Cameron, Deborah and Kulick, Don. Language and Sexuality. Cambridge, 2003. De Klerk, Vivian. “How Taboo Are Taboo Words For Girls?” [in:] Language in Society. Cambridge, 1992. Ferguson,  Charles  A. “Diglossia” (1959) [in:] Giglioli, Pier Paolo (ed.) Language and Social Context. Harmondsworth, 1972. Henley, Nancy. “This New Species That Seek a New Language: On Sexism in Language and Language Change” [in:] Penfield, Joyce (ed.) Woman and Language in Transtion. New York, 1987. Kaplan, Abraham. Obscenity as an Esthetic Category. http://scholarship.law.duke.edu/ cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2651&context=lcp. 1955. Access: August 10th, 2012. Peisert, Maria. Formy i funkcje agresji werbalnej [Forms and Functions of Verbal Aggression]. Wrocław, 2004. Widłak, Stanisław. “Zjawisko tabu językowego” [The Phenomenon of Linguistic Taboo], [In:] Kalina, Antoni (ed.). Lud, vol. 52. Lwów, 1968. Wynn, Lisa. In Egypt “Prostitute” is a Slippery Term. http://www.alternet.org/sex/89597/. Access: April 15th, 2010.

Case Studies from Europe

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Selected Body-Part Terms as a Means for Conveying Abstract Concepts in The Economist: The Case of Head, Eye, Mouth and Nose Tatiana Szczygłowska Abstract The human body and its distinct parts are considered to play an important role in the figurative comprehension of reality, which is partly due to the fact that they are clearly delineated in our minds. Our experience of the body is imaginatively mapped onto other domains, enabling us to fully understand and express concepts that are less tangible and cannot be easily determined or directly represented through language. The present study aims to give an insight into these phenomena, basing on an analysis of the figurative extensions of four source concepts: head, eye, mouth and nose in a corpus of the 1995–1996 issues of The Economist. Attention is devoted to those instances of use which play a role in the non-literal description of certain issues mediated by the magazine. The question is also addressed of whether the analyzed body part terms have been used to convey general or specialist concepts.

1 Introduction The human body and its distinct parts play a significant role in constructing our literal and non-literal world. This largely results from the extensional properties their names entail, which in turn enables their use in diversified contexts, combining the universal, cultural and individual dimensions of thought. Yet, given that an empirical and thus often literal description of the world through the use of these words may be unsatisfactory, their figurative extensions prove helpful in verbalizing those concepts which would otherwise remain in the sphere of mere imagination. Indeed, the non-literal aspects of body-part terms’ meaning potential contribute to the conceptualization of abstract ideas since “body metaphors are [. . .] partly based on genuine physical features, partly on convention, partly on imagination” and, moreover, their “universal and cultural aspects” are “intertwined” (Aitchison 2012: 188–189).

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���4 | doi ��.��63/9789004274297_�18

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Motivations for the Choice of the Analysed Body-Part Terms

The human body, owing to its central role in our lives, constitutes a rich source of metaphorical thinking and language. The semantic potential of different body-part names is partly due to the fact that most of them refer both to function and to appearance. For example, the head is the seat of the brain, and thus it is used for thinking and controlling the body, but on the other hand, it is roughly round in shape and positioned at the upper end of the body. These senses are often mapped onto concrete objects, based mainly on perceived similarity, as in head of a flower or head of a pencil. However, since the cognition of concrete objects is confined to a narrow range of experience, the attributes of body parts are also mapped onto abstract things, provided that physical or psychological analogies between the former and the latter can be drawn (Fangfang 2010: 10). Hence, expressions such as head of a household come into being. In this corpus-based study I focus on the figurative uses of head, eye, nose and mouth to see what concepts, discourse-specific or not, are communicated through these four lexemes in the British weekly magazine The Economist. They appear in the corpus either alone or are part of larger phrases, where their meaning is often extended metaphorically or metonymically. As Levin and Lindquist (2007: 91) point out, “metaphor is usually defined as using a word for something resembling its referent (e.g. the mouth of a river), while metonymy is defined as a figure of speech where one word or phrase is substituted for another with which it is closely associated (e.g. wrinkle one’s nose ‘show disapproval’).” In other words, in metaphor the understanding of one conceptual domain, usually an abstract one, is facilitated through describing it by means of expressions that relate to a more concrete or tangible domain, which is based on some kind of similarity between the two phenomena. By comparison, in metonymy one entity is used to provide mental access to another entity, which is based on the relationship of contiguity between the two within the same cognitive domain (Kövecses 2002: 160). Sometimes, a given figuratively used expression containing a body-part name may have either a metaphorical or metonymic reading, or even both at the same time, which is the case of what Radden (2000: 93) defines as “metonymy-based metaphor.” This phenomenon may be illustrated by the expression to catch someone’s ear, where ear can be interpreted as standing metonymically for attention, which is basically due to the fact that the organ of hearing serves as one of the channels for activating a person’s attention. As a result, the material action of taking hold of someone’s ear is metonymically conceptualized as a reason for capturing their attention. Simultaneously, the

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verb to catch “undergoes a metaphorical shift from a material to immaterial reading”, and then the whole phrase may be metaphorically interpreted as an attempt to obtain somebody’s attention (Geeraerts 2002: 463). The choice of the four aforementioned body-part names has been motivated by the fact that they seem to be interdependent, referring to those areas of the human body which together constitute an inseparable whole, that is, the face. Moreover, the body parts in question occupy the top levels in the hierarchy of what Andersen (1978: 338) considers as “the universal principles of categorization” for the semantic domain of human body parts, and since folk-taxonomies and “anatomical partonomies rarely exceed five hierarchical levels”, they are labelled in most world languages (Brown 1976: 404). 3

The Figurative Dimension of Popular Business Discourse

Popular business discourse, as typified in The Economist, is concerned with newsworthy issues related mostly to business and economy that are of topical interest, and often of entertainment value, to a readership of experts and generalists alike (Skorczyńska and Deignan 2006: 89). Given that such periodicals offer specialized articles on finance, business and economics, one may expect that the language they employ will be quite formal and packed with the professional lexicon of business sciences. The magazine itself declares a preference for simple language, marked by metaphoric scarcity, and yet, in an attempt to remain conversational and attractive to the readers, it often resorts to the resources of common speech, which tend to be somewhat more picturesque and colloquial.1 Since many economic ideas are fairly complex, one way to facilitate their understanding is through the use of figurative expressions which, as Greco (2009: 196) explains, enable one to make the issues discussed popular and simultaneously definite through vivid conceptualizations, constructing in this way a view of reality that keeps the readership engaged and captivated. Indeed, the possibility of formulating abstract concepts in terms of more familiar and commonly understood entities, based on the relations and correspondences between certain properties they share, often helps not only to fill terminological gaps or explain what would otherwise be unintelligible. It also allows one to entertain the audience and tailors the message to fit the journalistic style. 1 Declarations concerning the style of writing preferred by the magazine’s publishers can be found on The Economist website in the “About Us” folder (see further in bibliography under: The Economist. “About us: About The Economist”).

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The Method of Analysis

In the study undertaken on the four body-part terms: head, eye, nose and mouth, I was interested mainly in their meaning potential as a means for conveying abstract concepts in The Economist. The analysis was carried out using the computer-based concordancing program MicroConcord version 1.0 (Scott and Johns 1993), which enabled me to examine a corpus of authentic texts published in the years 1995-1996, containing almost 8 million words. I searched the corpus for all possible occurrences of the four words in their –s and non-s form, including proper names as well as their literal and figurative use as nouns, verbs, or as part of multi-word units, such as the adjective eye-catching or the adverb mouth-wateringly. The collected examples were subsequently subjected to a careful selection to isolate only those uses which play a role in the non-literal description of certain phenomena mediated by the newspaper. 5

Initial Results

For each of the search words, the program produced separate lists of entries, which altogether amounted to 3414 records. With reference to the total number of occurrences of each body-part term, as shown in Table 1, head occupied the first position, followed by eye, nose, and mouth. At this point occurrences of the search words identified as instances of their use as verbs were separated from the data, leaving a total of 3210 entries that were selected for further study and classification into relevant categories. The singulars and plurals of verbs were eliminated, since even though they are derivatives of nouns, to obtain an overall picture of their figurative dimension in the corpus, it would be necessary to consider also other inflected forms, such as heading or headed. Nevertheless, in one of the final sections of the present paper there will be presented a short summary of the main findings obtained for the use of head, eye, nose and mouth as verbs in their singular and plural form in the corpus. Table 1

The distribution of head, eye, nose and mouth use in the corpus

Number of occurrences Number of verb uses Number of occurrences selected for further study

HEAD

EYE

NOSE

MOUTH

Total

2205 191 2014

908 8 900

192 2 190

109 3 106

3414 204 3210

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6

Further Data Selection

The next step in the analysis was to calculate the total number of occurrences of each analysed body-part term in terms of two categories crucial to the study: figurative and other uses. Such an approach to the obtained results, the outcomes of which are shown in Table 2, proved useful in determining the frequency with which head, eye, nose and mouth occurred in the corpus in their non-literal meaning. The overall number of such examples amounted to 2628. After the initial results discussed above, it was not surprising to discover that the more a given lexeme was used in the corpus, the more prolific it turned out to be in terms of its meaning potential as a means for conveying abstract concepts. Table 2

The frequency of figurative and other uses of head, eye, nose and mouth in the corpus HEAD

Number of examples Total of other uses

2014 251 (12.46%) Literal uses 153 Proper names 23 Repeated examples 75 Figurative uses 1763 (87.54%)

EYE

NOSE

MOUTH

Total

900 217 (24.12%) 162 32 23 683 (75.88%)

190 70 (36.84%) 58 2 10 120 (63.16%)

106 44 (41.51%) 37 1 6 62 (58.49%)

3210 582 (18.13%) 410 58 117 2628 (81.87%)

Within the category of other uses, the occurrences which were not taken into consideration included the following: literal uses, proper names and examples that were repeated. As for the repetitions, in some cases the wording of the first line of an article was the same as its headline, and then I treated such occurrences as one use of a given body-part term. I adopted a similar approach to phrases like head-to-head which constituted an inseparable whole, where both uses of the word ‘head’ were in fact aimed at expressing one concept. As for the two remaining types of occurrences which were excluded from the analysis, worth noting is the fact that when head, eye, nose and mouth were used in their literal meaning, they served as nouns referring to the different parts of the body, for instance:

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(1) Wrestlers wash their faces, mouths and armpits before entering the dohyo (ring), on whose sacred sand neither shoes nor women may tread. [TE: 22 Jun 1996] Sometimes head, eye, nose and mouth formed parts of various proper names, and even if they were used in their figurative meaning, just as in the example below, they were not taken into consideration: (2) Most recently, George Bush raised taxes, promoted a new public-education effort called Head Start, and presided over a massive increase in regulation. [TE: 10 Aug 1996] In this particular case, head is followed by the word start to form a phrase referring to an initial advantage in a competitive situation. This concept was used to name a U.S. educational program for disadvantaged pre-school children aimed at preparing them for elementary education by providing education, health, nutrition and parent involvement services. 7

Main Results and Discussion

In the discussion that follows, I demonstrate various figurative uses of the source concepts head, eye, mouth and nose and their meaning in respective contexts. The analysed examples have been selected mostly for their representativeness in terms of the frequency of occurrence in the corpus. Typically, a distinction is made between the metonymic and metaphorical processes involving the lexemes in question to reveal which aspects of embodiment play an important role in conceptualizing the four body parts in The Economist. 7.1 HEAD In the vast majority of examples, head stands metonymically for person. When focus is on statistics or economic indicators, the concept of person is further interpreted as an individual whom given numerical data concern, and then the phrase per head is employed, as in: (3) According to the latest figures from the World Bank, American uses 1,870 cubic metres of water per person in a year, 18.9% of its total available water resources; Britain uses only 205 cubic metres per head (16.6% of total resources). [TE: 27 Jan 1996]

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Alternatively, the noun is preceded by the indefinite article when reference is made to specific sums of money which are spent on, earned by or charged from an average person, as in Dollars 200 a head or Sky takes Pounds 6 a head. Added to that are also those cases in which head is used alone to refer to an individual, which in the corpus is often instantiated by the plural form heads premodified by a nationality adjective to refer collectively to the inhabitants of a particular country, as exemplified by the considerable number of Chinese heads. Interestingly, in the context of enumeration, common are such phrases as 50 head of cattle, where head is used figuratively to refer to a single animal, which is then seen as a unit in numbering cattle or game. Returning now to those occurrences in which head is metonymically equated with person, when focus is on the business of recruiting personnel, the term denotes a potential employee, and then various alternative forms of the concept of ‘head-hunting’ are utilized. Yet, examples such as hunting for new heads seem to carry additional figurative implications. Since the ‘heads’ that are hunted should be clever and thus valuable to the company, head is also seen as standing for the brain of a highly intelligent person or even the person’s intellectual ability itself. Sometimes head is used figuratively to denote a human character trait or some attribute, which can metonymically stand for persons having those qualities. Generally, this is observed in the case of such phrases as wiser heads, cooler heads or hot heads, in which the basic head-for-person metonymy activates another non-literal trope, enabling one to link the mental or physical properties of the head with the most salient properties of the person (RadićBojanić and Silaški 2012: 36). In numerous examples, head is “the source domain for the target sense leader, based on the metonymy head-for-person (and the metaphor ‘leader is the top’)” (Siahaan 2011: 95). This figurative use of the lexeme is usually realized by the noun forms head and heads followed by the preposition of, but phrases like co-head or ex-head are also popular. Indeed, approximately half of all the occurrences of head constitute those in which the abstract concept of leadership is targeted through the use of the term in various metaphors based on a similarity of function or position. Hence, frequent are such phrases as the head of the World Trade Organisation or the heads of government. However, alternative versions similar to the central bank’s titular head are also relatively popular. Even though in a large majority of such examples it is some official body whose most important member is conventionally represented by the forms head and heads, the analysis shows that the leaders of somewhat less official groups of people can also be conceptualized in the same way. However, expressions

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resembling, for instance, the head of a queue or heads of household, are actually quite uncommon in The Economist. Common in the corpus are also those examples in which the form head is used as a modifier to denote how important the concept represented by another noun is. As Siahaan (2011: 101) maintains, this is “motivated by a cognitive model is which the human head is conceptualized as the main body part, i.e., it is more important than any other body part,” as in the following sentence: (4) When the head office of Credit Lyonnais was gutted by fire in May, French taxpayers no doubt hoped it would be the last time that billions of francs shovelled into the troubled state-owned bank would go up in smoke. [TE: 17 Aug 1996] Another important figurative use of head constitute those examples in which it is seen as the locus of thought. A frequent extension of this conceptualization is motivated by the metaphor ‘the head is a container’ in which ideas or thoughts, as metaphorical objects, are located, and where thinking takes place (Siahaan 2011: 96-97). This sense is typically activated through the use of such phrases as in his head or inside ordinary people’s heads, when in the relevant context explicit reference is made to somebody’s involvement in various mental processes. Similar connotations are seen in the wording: the world’s scientists would need to put their heads together, where the concept of collective thinking is alluded to. In the same vein, the head, standing metonymically for mind or intellect, is contrasted with the heart, considered as the seat of emotions, as illustrated by example (5): (5) But we shall allow our heart to rule our head, put a notional fiver on a mix of talent and teamwork, and cheer on the Dutch youngsters. [TE: 8 Jun 1996] Last but not least, such conventionalized expressions as the floating recording head or at the head of the table indicate that head is also used metaphorically in relation to things or their parts resembling a head in form or position. By comparison, in the case of head-on collisions, head is conceptualized as the frontal part of the cars that collided with one another. However, there are also numerous sentences in which head-on is further extended metaphorically to denote the concept of ‘being in direct opposition’, that is, ‘in open conflict’. Once again, it seems that the idea of directness is due to the fact that it typically involves the confrontation of the most prominent parts, as in:

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(6) But when 51 Bundestag backbenchers confronted the issue head-on this week and tabled a resolution to delay the move to Berlin by ‘at least five years the fog began to clear. [TE: 28 Sep 1996] 7.2 EYE Eye, considered as the organ of visual perception, most often stands metonymically for watching. This can be observed, for instance, in example (7) where the phrase to cast their eyes is meant to imply the action of scanning or looking at: (7) Not quite, but ambitious farmers are starting to cast their eyes heavenwards in search of a little extra-terrestrial inspiration in the usually utterly land-lubberly business of growing crops. [TE: 27 Jan 1996] Still, in a number of examples this basic metonymy is figuratively extended to other sight-related concepts. In a majority of cases, watching is further metonymically equated with attention, which in turn is most frequently instantiated by keep/turn an/one’s eye on, meaning ‘be attentive to’. Quite often, the body-part term is premodified by an adjective describing the disposition of the person looking. For instance, in the case of keeps a hopeful eye on Mr Perot’s efforts, it might be said that the eye is additionally metaphorized as a container of hope. What is interesting about such examples is that in a majority of them these are banks, firms or other authoritative bodies like the government that need to be attentive mostly to financial matters or other economically suspicious circumstances. By contrast, another frequent phrase—turn a blind eye (to)—denotes a lack of attention or even disregard. As Hilpert (2006: 135) maintains, a blind eye stands for non-attention, since the eye-for-watching metonymy feeds the ‘nonwatching for disregard’ metonymy, as in: (8) During the war in Bosnia, when Iran, defying a UN embargo, helped keep the Muslim-led government in arms, America turned a blind eye. [TE: 23 Nov 1996] There are also numerous occurrences in which the watching-for-attention figurative use of eye is realized through different alternative forms of catch the eye, meaning ‘attract attention’. Thus, it is possible to find in the corpus such expressions as eye-catching annual summits of Asians, this periphery eyecatchingly includes or this deal has itself caught the eye of. Added to that is also the pattern in the public eye, in the case of which either particular individuals or their behaviour are brought ‘under the attention and scrutiny of the public’.

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The same metonymic chain leading from the eye to attention is established for the following phrases: eyes are ( fixed) on, eyes are turning to/toward/ from as well as for their numerous alternatives like with eyes on or eyes are focused on. However, in the case of with an eye/eyes on, the metonymic link, with the eye-for-watching metonymy at the basis, is either watching-forattention or watching-for-wanting, as illustrated below in examples (9) and (10) respectively: (9) Sports reporters can be a stodgy bunch, with eyes on the ball, not the colourful detail. [TE: 16 Dec 1996] (10) French department stores have boosted sales of clothing from a quarter to half their total sales, with an eye on faster stock-turn. [TE: 4 Mar 1995] The same metonymic extension of the eye, where the activity of watching is linked with wanting, is observable in the case of have an/one’s eye(s) on, denoting ‘have as one’s objective’. Here, “an activity that is accessible to the observer stands for a non-observable mental state” (Hilpert 2006: 134), which is clearly seen in examples similar to he has an eye on Mr Lee’s coalition offer or Mr Juppe has his eye on the next presidential election. Other occurrences worth mentioning with the eye-for-watching metonymy at the basis are also those in which watching is further metonymically equated with: a) interest, as in: (11)  First, those with an eye for short-term gains are wasting their time if they focus solely on domestic economic fundamentals. [TE: 24 Feb 1996] b) supervision, as in: (12)  But to make quite sure, voters will make their choice in public, collecting a picture of their chosen candidate from a table under the eye of security men. [TE: 24 Feb 1996] c) concern, as in: (13)  Consider a rich young woman applying to an elite university. Her mother is Mexican [. . .] If her parents had thought about it with an eye to this day, they might have chosen to call her, say, Maria Perez. [TE: 16 Nov 1996] d) intending, as in: (14)  But after allowing for these effects, it seems that chief executives’ pay was often set with an eye to placating critics among customers and regulators. [TE: 25 Feb 1995]

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As may be seen in examples (13) and (14), sometimes one phrase is employed to convey different meanings. The same applies to example (11), since in certain sentences containing have/with an eye for and one’s eye for, eye stands metonymically for vision. Hilpert (2006: 135) claims that since “vision is the most reliable human faculty of perception”, it “licenses the vision-for-good perception metonymy”, which can be seen in such expressions as: with a rare eye for detail and quality or Mr Buffett has an uncanny eye for spotting talented individuals. Here, the adjective which is used before the noun eye is meant to emphasize the fact that nothing can adversely affect the quality of what is seen. Sometimes the eye-for-vision metonymy is extended whereby vision is further metonymically linked with revelation. Most of such uses of eye denote the idea of experiencing some enlightening or astonishing disclosure, which is best illustrated by such expressions as an eye-opening array or an eye-popping 44% in dollar terms. By comparison, the phrase in the/one’s mind’s eye, with the same metonymy at the basis, denotes ‘in one’s imagination’, however since the mind does not see anything, what is experienced here as visual perception is in fact mental imagery (Hilpert 2006: 137). Among some other non-literal uses of eye worthy of attention are those in which the eye stands metonymically for beholder, where someone becomes aware of something through the sense of sight, as illustrated by pleasing to the eye or to the casual eye, China might seem to be defeating inflation. Another large group of the figurative uses of eye comprises the examples in which the body part is metaphorically conceptualized as a container “that gathers and stores visual and cognitive information” (Siahaan, 2011: 107). Some­ times it is opinion or a particular perspective from which something is viewed that is stored in the eye, as in: (15) Unlike the good folk who labour to provide real goods and services, the ‘punters’, in most people’s eyes, add no value to the economy. [TE: 6 Apr 1996] In other examples, it is one’s characteristic or feeling that is contained in the eye. For instance, in the case of such phrases as a disillusioned eye or the benevolent eye of, and especially in those expressions in which the words in and into precede the forms eye or eyes, as in a twinkle in his eye, the eye is seen as an object where such abstract things as disillusionment or a twinkle are located. Additionally, the eyes are metaphorized as containers for emotions also in the case of such phrases as: with tears in one’s eyes, bring tears to one’s eye, eyes are brimming or moisten one’s eyes over. Here, the eyes are conceptualized as containers for tears, which in turn stand metonymically for the feeling of sadness.

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Last but not least, the figurative uses of eye are often associated with the conceptualizations of the body part as an object with various topographical features. The metaphorical mappings are largely based on similarities between the target and particular properties of the eye and its parts, “such as concentric configuration of the iris and pupil, centrality of the pupil [. . .] and the spherical shape of the eyeball” (Siahaan, 2011: 107). Such a comment can be made, for instance, with regard to the wording: passing it through the eye of the needle of Orkney. By comparison, in the case of in the eye of the storm, eye is metaphorically used to refer to the central or essential part of an abstract concept, which is also due to some similarity in shape, since the middle part of a storm is a hole-like thing likened to the eye. 7.3 MOUTH It has been observed that mouth is most often used metaphorically in relation to topographical phenomena which resemble a mouth. Among such instances, the most frequent are the conceptualizations of the point where a river meets the sea, mainly by means of the conventionalized phrase the mouth of a river but also using the expression the river’s mouth. Additionally, the openings of tunnels and other things having a containing capacity are referred to in this way as well, for instance, the mouth of the tunnel or the mouth of the vent. Another important group of mouth uses constitute those examples in which the lexeme stands metonymically for speech or speaking. Even though the group comprises the largest number of mouth occurrences in the corpus, it is highly diversified in terms of the number of phrases that fall into this set. The one that occurs most often is (by) word of mouth, meaning ‘by spoken words, orally’, and its adjectival form word-of-mouth, which in the corpus serves as a premodifier, characterizing for instance recommendations. In several expressions mouth, considered as the instrument of speech, is accompanied by verbs indicating either the beginning of someone’s talking, as in open one’s mouth, or somebody’s refraining from speaking, as in keep one’s mouth shut or to shut one’s mouth. As Deignan and Potter (2004: 1246) observe, such expressions “are all examples of metaphor from metonymy: all could be literally true, based on” the mouth-for-speaking metonymy, “but all are also used metaphorically”. The same may be said about another phrase identified in the corpus, namely, put money where one’s mouth is, which generally means ‘to take appropriate action to support what one has said’. Among the examples in which the mouth stands metonymically for speaking, and the whole expression is metaphorical, worth mentioning are also the following ones:

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(16) Mr Prescott is famous for his fractured syntax and meandering mouth. [TE: 18 May 1995] (17) For a while, the Likud and its supporters will find it uncomfortable to hear their words in the mouth of the prime minister’s assassin. [TE: 11 Nov 1995] (18) When Dennis Renault mockingly put the word ‘nigger’ into the mouth of a vicious white supremacist in an anti-racist cartoon last year, 1,400 readers of the Sacramento Bee cancelled their subscriptions. [TE: 16 Dec 1995] (19) Give Lotto Dosh to Tots not Toffs’ said an article in another tabloid, the News of the World. They took the words out of our mouth. [TE: 29 Jul 1995] It is interesting to note that in example (16) mouth is used to refer to somebody’s way of speaking, and it is owing to the metaphorical meaning of the premodifying adjective that such uses of the lexeme are cases of metonymy within metaphor. By comparison, in the remaining examples, the basic mouthfor-speaking metonymy is metaphorically extended to convey the concept of mouth as a container that words can be put in or taken out of. Additionally, the mouth, the primary function of which is to serve as the beginning of the digestive system, is conceptualized as a container that food literally goes into or is taken out of, which is exemplified by such occurrences of the noun as in taking food out of the mouths of working people’s children. In a number of examples, mouth stands metonymically for eating since the body part in question serves above all for the ingestion of food. This is observed in sentences containing the adjective mouth-watering and the adverb mouthwateringly, which both by extension refer metaphorically to the attractiveness of something. As Lindquist and Levin (2008: 153) claim, the metaphor carries positive overtones, “which follows from the original literal meaning—only food that looks and smells good makes your mouth water”. It is often used in the context of financial reporting, which is the case in The Economist. Hence, in examples similar to a mouth-watering 22.6% return on equity, mouth can be metaphorically interpreted to represent the feeling of pleasure. However, when the mouth is conceptualized as a vehicle for the expression of emotions, it mainly involves the negative or serious ones. Then, the physical responses to the emotions are taken to stand metonymically for the emotion itself (Kövecses 2000: 133–134). An example could be the phrase down in the mouth which makes reference to the downward turned corners of the mouth as a sign of dissatisfaction. By comparison, in the case of the adjective mouthfoaming, which is a derivative of the phrase to foam at the mouth, it is wrath that is conveyed due to the fact that when people are very angry, they sometimes produce foam at the mouth.

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Lastly, there are also examples in which mouth stands metonymically for person, viewed as a consumer of food. Such sentences make explicit reference to the main role that the body part plays in our daily life, which is eating, as in: (20) In the ten years to 1993, growth failed to keep up with the rapid arrival of new mouths to feed; GDP per head declined each year. [TE: 20 May 1995] 7.4 NOSE The nose, serving primarily as the organ used for smelling and breathing, often stands metonymically for smell, understood as aroma or bouquet, as in the following example: (21) A small quantity of brewer’s alcohol is often added in the final stages of the brewing process to lighten the sake’s flavour and enhance its nose. [TE: 21 Dec 1996] Sometimes, depending on a specific context, nose may be further interpreted as various other smell-related concepts. This can be said about those occurrences of the body-part term in which it is part of the phrase (have) a nose for something, where the sense of smell is metaphorically compared to intuition or instinct (Levin and Lindquist 2007: 104). By comparison, in another expression identified in the corpus: under one’s nose, reference is made to somebody’s sphere of influence or even field of vision. Here, as Levin and Lindquist (2007: 96) point out, the nose is “connected to the eyes via their proximity in the face, and, more indirectly, someone’s field of vision is linked metonymically to ‘influence’ or ‘control’ ”. There are also examples in which nose is metonymically connected to unpleasant smell, and further to certain conventionalized gestures. If such phrases are not literally true, they are instances of metaphor from metonymy. As Deignan and Potter (2004: 1248) note, the figurative meaning stands for the emotion conveyed through the gesture, as in: (22) The economy is purring along nicely no recession is in sight and even if one were many voters would probably hold their noses and vote Labour in the belief that any other party would be worse. [TE: 26 Oct 1996] The meaning of the above expression is ‘attempt to ignore something unpleasant, illegal, or rotten’. It is quite common in “texts about politics where it often occurs in relation to the act of voting”, often for the least-disliked candidate (Levin and Lindquist 2007: 94).

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The concept of nose in connection with gestures and emotions associated with them is also utilized in two distinct expressions conveying disdain, either of which involves a different physical action performed by the nose. In one of the two phrases, to turn one’s nose up at, as used in Boeing has always turned up its nose at making jets smaller, the action of raising one’s nose is metaphorically interpreted as a sign of disregard. The same can be said about to look down one’s nose at, as employed in Mauritians, who look down their noses at the work their parents do. Here, it is also the case that the metonymic link between the nose and the action described by the phrase is metaphorically extended to express the emotion associated with this particular gesture. By comparison, examples containing nose-thumbing as well as those with different alternative forms of thumb one’s nose at, both of which represent another conventionalized gesture, refer metaphorically to an instinctive reaction of scorn or ridicule. Similar non-literal metonymic sense is expressed in the corpus also by expressions presented in examples (23) and (24), in which reference to the behavioural reaction of raising one’s nose is used to stand for the feeling of superiority: (23) By presenting himself as a man of deep experience yet with the common touch, he has made the Socialist candidate, Lionel Jospin, seem merely dull and the prime minister, Edouard Balladur, look like a nose-in-the-air bourgeois. [TE: 1 Apr 1995] (24) When a British tabloid overloaded its opposition to a single European currency with a lavatorial assault on Helmut Kohl this week, Bild contended itself with a factual front-page snippet headlined: ‘British press insults the chancellor’. The Frankfurter’s nose was too high to notice such vulgarity. [TE: 15 Jun 1996] Several phrases containing nose are used to convey the speaker’s evaluations of the actions referred to. One of such examples constitutes the phrase pay through the nose, meaning ‘pay excessively’, which expresses one’s disapproving attitude towards the discussed issue. Yet a different concept, that of defeat or damage, connoting a positive attitude towards those who show defiance against mighty opponents, is conveyed by various subpatterns of the phrase to give someone a bloody nose. Here, “the exposed position of the nose is habitually linked metaphorically” to an opportunity for someone to inflict damage on someone else (Levin and Lindquist 2007: 103). To explain the sense of such occurrences of the form nose as, for instance, in Vietnamese defenders bloodied China’s nose, it is also worth considering another interpretation. In particular, Diez (2008) focuses on the case of black eye, maintaining that by means of the

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metonymic mapping in which the phrase stands for ‘punch’, one can mention the result of an action to refer to the cause that brought it about. Additionally, the consequences of this action are brought into focus, since “the result of physical aggression is metonymically used to refer to aggression itself” (Diez 2008: 206). Certain figurative uses of nose also carry the implications of animal behaviour (Levin and Lindquist 2007: 95). Among such examples, the most frequent ones are poke/stick one’s nose into as well as its noun form nose-poking, where allusion is made to the way in which animals position their body when they want to smell something. However, because the phrases are used mostly in their non-literal sense, the speaker in fact refers metonymically to the nose to represent one’s interference into somebody else’s affairs. A parallel with animal behaviour is also seen in very similar expressions which, owing to the use of the prepositional sequence out of, convey the opposite meaning, namely, that of not getting involved, as in: (25) The new drugs, by contrast, clobber the virus after this, at the point where it sticks its nose out of its host’s nucleus and gets the cell’s machinery to start churning out new viral proteins. [TE: 23 Jun 1996] (26) The prime minister has issued an edict that the committee should keep its nose out of such business. [TE: 20 May 1995] Similar implications are carried by the metaphorical phrase rub one’s nose in, meaning ‘make somebody acutely aware of a fault’, which alludes to the process of housebreaking a puppy by rubbing its nose in its excrement, as used in the UN’s social development summit, which is to rub the world’s nose in the fact that [. . .]. Last but not least, certain figurative uses of the lexeme allude to the fact that, anatomically, the nose is considered as the end-point of the body. Metaphors such as nose of the plane map the source domain of the body onto the target domain of an aircraft or vehicle in relation to the object’s projecting part or edge. This comment also applies to many examples containing the phrase nose-dive, which refers to a sudden plunge with the nose or front pointing downwards, but when it is used in more figurative terms, as in continue their nose-dives in the opinion polls, it means ‘a sudden drop’. 8

Selected Verb Uses of the Analyzed Body-Part Terms

To complement the above discussion, it also seems worth looking at those figurative uses of the investigated lexemes in which they serve as verbs. To start

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with, when head functions as a verb in the corpus, it often stands metonymically for moving. This may be due to the fact that the head, as the seat of the brain, controls the body also in terms of the movements it makes, which additionally entails the concept of leadership. Usually, the ‘head-for-moving’ conceptualization is used with reference to the actual shaping of the course in a specified direction. For instance, in the case of wordings similar to appeared to head east toward Nigeria, reference is made to the concept of advancing towards a particular point. By comparison, in fresh young hopefuls head off to seek their fortune an indirect allusion is made to the idea of leaving a place. Sometimes a given phrase in which head functions as a verb is employed to convey different meanings. Such a conclusion can be drawn when analyzing the following two examples: (27) The United Nations heads for bankruptcy. [TE: 10 Feb 1996] (28) If they do have a choice, according to the Fodor’s survey, Americans head for a Haven with beautiful scenery and high standards of hygiene and cleanliness. [TE: 13 May 1995] In (27) the body-part word is linked with the action of making one’s way towards something, which in this particular case is the state of bankruptcy. However, in (28) the head-for-moving figurative use of the lexeme is extended, since the concept of moving is further metonymically replaced by ‘aiming for’. Additionally, there are numerous examples in which head, based on the metonymy head-for-person, is by extension used figuratively to convey the sense of leadership, due to the metaphoric conceptualization of leader as one who is in charge. This is observed in such examples as a Gingrichite who heads a group, where the final element of the figurative mapping is the metonymic link between the forms head or heads and the action of governing. With regard to the use of eye as a verb, its most frequent non-literal occurrence in the corpus is the one in which it stands metonymically for watching, or rather for the action that the organ of sight is typically involved in, as illustrated by a forester eyes a tree for felling. By comparison, mouth is sometimes employed as a verb to refer to the very act of uttering something, basing on the metonymy mouth-for-speaking, as in he occasionally mouths run-off-the-mill Slavophilia. Unfortunately, not much can be said about the verb uses of nose due to the fact that such occurrences are extremely rare in the corpus. Still, comments can be made about one such example, namely, they nose gently through the air. Here, the nose, standing metonymically for the foremost part of the body, is used figuratively to convey the idea of moving forward slowly and carefully with one’s most prominent part directed in a certain direction.

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9 Conclusions Summing up, the analysis shows that the metaphoric and metonymic extensions of head, eye, nose and mouth play a significant role in retaining a reservoir of stylistic features that are necessary to construct a particular view of reality and affect the cognitive performance of those interested in business press articles found in The Economist. By utilizing images taken from contexts that are more familiar to the audience and mapping the relevant properties onto some abstract economic concepts, journalists try to provide “epistemic access to alternative aspects of reality” (Walters-York 1996: 59). As a result, when the readers encounter, for instance, the wording eye-popping GDP growth rates, they in fact learn more about the economic success of a country than is conveyed by the mere words used in the text, developing simultaneously a somewhat deeper understanding of the subject matter than they would if the acronym GDP was simply preceded by the adjective high. Indeed, the use of figurative expressions in business media texts helps to inform about often complex and purely theoretical problems in a way which is not only transparent but also attractive to the average reader. Yet, it emerges from the analysis that even though “the language in The Economist shares” some “resemblance with the language of formal economics”, many of the non-literal uses of the four body-part terms seem to display that dimension of their meaning potential which is slightly more favourable to general rather than genre-specific concepts (Henderson 2000: 170). Certainly, the fact that the magazine represents business discourse accounts for the popularity of such expressions as per head to talk about statistics, mouth-watering to report on finances or head in the context of leadership. However, because such discourse is popular rather than scientific, most of the figurative uses of head, eye, nose and mouth play an eye-catching role, and do not really seem to belong to the terminological repertoire of the economic domain. Overall, the present study contributes to the ongoing discussion on the figurative senses of lexis related to the human body in the English language. The main areas of research in this field encompass, among other things, a number of cross-linguistic investigations focusing on selected body-part terms as a source for metaphors and metonymies denoting more abstract concepts and entities, mainly in general or journalistic texts. Worth mentioning here are, for instance, Deingan and Potter’s (2004) comparisons of the use of nose, mouth, eye and heart in English and Italian corpora of general language, or Nissen’s (2011) comments on the use of mouth in Danish, English and Spanish. Added to that is also Hilpert’s (2006) mono-linguistic investigation of the lexeme eye in the British National Corpus as well as Levin and Lindquist’s (2007) analysis

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of the use of nose, but also of foot and mouth (Lindquist and Levin 2008), both of the latter providing an insight into general linguistic material. However, it seems that the same phenomena have not been so eagerly examined in terms of their occurrence in somewhat more scientific corpora, especially those representing business discourse. There are, of course, studies which seek to identify the figurative dimension of economics and its more or less specialized discourse, such as the ones undertaken by Boers (1999) on counting metaphors in the socio-economic domain, Vaghi and Venuti (2003) on movement metaphors, Koller (2003) on metaphor clusters as well as on general metaphor usage (2006), Charteris-Black (2004) on metaphors in financial reporting, Greco (2009) on metaphorical headlines in business, finance and economic magazines, or González (2011) on the container schema. Attempts have also been made to compare metaphor use in scientific and popular business discourse (Skorczyńska and Piqué-Angordans 2005, Skorczyńska and Deignan 2006). Nevertheless, it appears that little attention has been devoted to similar texts with regard to the non-literal meaning potential of particular bodypart words. This comment is especially relevant to findings obtained through corpus-based methods which are helpful in providing quantitative data comparable to those presented here. One possible reason behind this may be the fact that figurative language research goes beyond familiarizing oneself with the concordance lines generated by a search for particular linguistic items (Stefanowitsch 2006, Wikberg 2008). Indeed, once a given orthographic word form from the source domain under investigation is identified, such as mouth or head in the case of the present study, its respective target domain needs to be defined through manual inspection of relevant contexts, provided that the automatic results obtained from the corpus have been first sorted into literal and non-literal uses. Yet, even though such analyses prove to be quite challenging, the examples of head, eye, nose and mouth use discussed here may serve as an incentive for future investigations of the figurative mappings underlying different body-part terms in popular business discourse. References Aitchison, Jean. Words in the Mind: An Introduction to the Mental Lexicon. 4th ed. WileyBlackwell, 2012. Andersen, Elaine S. “Lexical Universals of Body-Part Terminology.” In: Universals of Human Language, Vol. 3: Word Structure, edited by Joseph H. Greenberg, 335–68. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1978.

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Boers, Frank. “When a Bodily Source Domain Becomes Prominent: the Joy of Counting Metaphors in the Socio-Economic Domain.” In Metaphor in Cognitive Linguistics, edited by Raymond W. Gibbs, Jr., and Gerard J. Steen. 47–56. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 1999. Brown, Cecil H. “General Principles of Human Anatomical Partonomy and Speculations on the Growth of Partonomic Nomenclature.” American Ethnologist 3 (1976): 400–24. Charteris-Black, Jonathan. Corpus Approaches to Critical Metaphor Analysis. Basingstoke/ New York: Palgrave MacMillan. 2004. Deignan, Alice, and Liz Potter. “A Corpus Study of Metaphors and Metonyms in English and Italian.” Journal of Pragmatics 36 (2004): 1231–52. Diez, Olga Isabel. “Metaphor, Metonymy and Colour Terms: A Cognitive Analysis.” In Corpus Linguistics: Applications for the Study of English, edited by Ana Maria Hornero, Maria José Luzon, and Silvia Murillo, 197–214. Peter Lang, 2008. Fangfang, Wang. “The Metaphorical and Metonymical Expressions Including Face and Eye in Everyday Language.” An unpublished student thesis, Kristianstad University College, Department of Teacher Education, 2010, accessed September 14, 2011, http://hkr.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:292843/FULLTEXT01.pdf. Geeraerts, Dirk. “The Interaction of Metaphor and Metonymy in Composite Expressions.” In Metaphor and Metonymy in Comparison and Contrast, edited by René Dirven and Ralf Pörings, 435–65. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 2002. González, Rafael Alejo. “The container schema in economics and its discourse.” International Journal of Innovation and Leadership in the Teaching of Humanities 1, 1 (2011): 64–79. Greco, Sergio. “Metaphorical Headlines in Business, Finance and Economic Magazines.” Linguistica e Filologia 28 (2009): 193–211. Henderson, Willie. “Metaphor, Economics and ESP: Some Comments.” English for Specific Purposes 19, 2 (2000): 167–73. Hilpert, Martin. “Keeping an Eye on the Data: Metonymies and their Patterns.” In Corpus-based Approaches to Metaphor and Metonymy, edited by Anatol Stefano­ witsch and Stefan Th. Gries. 123–52. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 2006. Koller, Veronika. “Metaphor Clusters in Business Media Discourse: A Social Cognition Approach” PhD thesis submitted to the Department of English, University of Vianna, 2003, accessed December 11, 2012, http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/ download?doi=10.1.1.86.8386&rep=rep1&type=pdf. ——— “Of Critical Importance: Using Electronic Text Corpora to Study Metaphor in Business Media Discourse.” In Corpus-based Approaches to Metaphor and Metonymy,

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edited by Anatol Stefanowitsch and Stefan Th. Gries. 237–66. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 2006. Kövecses, Zoltán. Metaphor and Emotion: Language, Culture and the Body in Human Feeling. Cambridge: Cambrigde University Press, 2000. ——— Metaphor: A Practical Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Levin, Magnus, and Hans Lindquist. “Sticking One’s Nose in the Data: Evaluation in Phraseological Sequences with Nose.” ICAME Journal 31 (2007): 87–110. Lindquist, Hans, and Magnus Levin. “Foot and Mouth. The Phrasal Patterns of Two Frequent Nouns.” In Phraseology. An Interdisciplinary Perspective, edited by Sylviane Granger and Fanny Meunier, 143–58. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2008. Nissen, Uwe Kjær. “Contrasting Body Parts: Metaphors and Metonymies of MOUTH in Danish, English, and Spanish.” In Embodiment via Body Parts, edited by Graham Low, Zazie Todd, Alice Deignan, and Lynne Cameron, 71–92. John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2011. Oxford English Dictionary. 4th edition CD-ROM. Radden, Günter. “How Metonymic are Metaphors?”. In Metaphor and Metonymy at the Crossroads. A Cognitive Perspective, edited by Antonio Barcelona, 93–108. Berlin and New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 2000. Radić-Bojanić, Biljana, and Nadežda Silaški. “Metaphoric and Metonymic Conceptualizations of the Head—A Dictionary-Based Contrastive Analysis of English and Serbian.” FACTA UNIVERSITATIS, Series: Linguistics and Literature 10, 1 (2012): 29–39. Scott, Mike, and Tim Johns. MicroConcord. Version 1.0. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993. Siahaan, Poppy. “HEAD and EYE in German and Indonesian Figurative Uses.” In Embodiment via Body Parts, edited by Graham Low, Zazie Todd, Alice Deignan, and Lynne Cameron, 93–114. John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2011. Skorczyńska, Hanna and Jordi Piqué-Angordans. “A corpus-based description of metaphorical marking patterns in scientific and popular business discourse.” Metaphorik. de 9 (2005): 112–29. Skorczyńska, Hanna, and Alice Deignan. “Readership and Purpose in the Choice of Economics Metaphors.” Metaphor and Symbol 21, 2 (2006): 87–104. Stefanowitsch, Anatol. “Words and their metaphors: A corpus-based approach.” In Corpus-Based Approaches to Metaphor and Metonymy, edited by Anatol Stefanowitsch and Stefan Th. Gries. 63–105. Berlin & New York: Mouton de Gruyter, 2006. The Economist. “About Us: About The Economist.” Accessed September 13, 2011. http:// www.economist.com/help/about-us#About_The_Economist.

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Semiotic Conceptualization of the Human Body and the Case Study of Russian ‘Navel’ Grigory E. Kreydlin, Svetlana I. Pereverzeva and Lidia A. Khesed Abstract The present chapter describes a linguistic phenomenon of semiotic conceptualization of the human body as it is presented in Russian language and culture. We give a definition to the somatic objects as the core subjects of non-verbal semiotics and present a methodology of their classification according to their physical, structural and functional features. We identify the specific features which are peculiar to the corporeal signs and which build a framework for their typology. As an example we present the semiotic conceptualization of one somatic object, namely the navel. 1

Introduction

When performing face-to-face communicative acts and utterances, human beings use not only verbal but also nonverbal signs. Nonverbal signs and messages identify aspects of mental and psychological activities and underline some cognitive processes that verbal utterances cannot articulate. So it is not surprising that nowadays linguists and specialists in nonverbal communication are combining their efforts and adjusting their theoretical concepts, metalanguages, and methodology to describe the behavior of the human body in interaction. Researchers are interested in whether participants of the dialog look at each other, what distance they keep in communicative acts of different kinds, how they orient their bodies, whether they use any gestures, etc. The disciplines and explorative fields to which the paper is related are semiotics and linguistics of the human body and corporeality. We shall discuss two languages: the Russian language and the Russian body language (Body Russian). The relationship between the main lexical units of these languages, words, and corporeal signs (gestures, postures, facial expressions and some other signs)1 may be viewed from different perspectives. 1 All the mentioned meaningful corporeal units we will sometimes call gestures in a broader sense of the word.

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First, commonalities between the verbal and nonverbal units may be stressed. Second, a system of nonverbal signs can be regarded as entirely distinct from the corresponding natural language. In this case students of nonverbal communication single out specific semantic ideas and corporal means of their expression in a text and underline the difference between the nonverbal units and those peculiar to verbal communication. The third perspective attempts to combine the first two. We promote a unified approach in which words and corporeal signs are described together within one framework and in one semantic metalanguage. The advantages of the synthetic approach we pursue here seem clear: it permits us to express both common and distinctive features of Russian and Body Russian units in the light of each other. Evidences from communicative practices as well as from linguistic and semiotic theories of dialog and cognition have convincingly shown that words and gestures in a broader sense of the word are not independent. Being formally and functionally different, they interact and make up an integral part of the process of speaking (see McNeill 2000, Kendon 2004, Enfield 2009). Our paper is a part of the large project that was launched several years ago.2 The final goal of the project is to construct the semiotic conceptualization of human body (Arkadyev, Kreydlin & Letuchiy 2008; Kreydlin 2009). The semiotic conceptualization of human body is a formal model that reflects how bo­dies and their parts are presented in the languages we consider. It includes the natural and body language representation of different somatic objects, their physical, structural and functional characteristics as well as the representation of properties of their possessors. The model is based on the data of different natural languages and body languages. In constructing the semiotic conceptualization of the human body we compare at the same time the expressive possibilities and effectiveness of the natural and body languages discussed. The semiotic conceptualization of human body provides the fundamental theoretical and methodological tools and also offers many practical instruments for describing the bodily vocabulary and grammar. The major components of the semiotic conceptualization are the representations of the human body itself, body parts, organs, corporeal liquids, coverings, muscles, and other types of somatic objects as well as those of their features. These representations account for how ordinary Russian speakers refer to the body and other somatic objects, and how they use their bodies in performing gestures of different types in everyday communication. 2 This project has been supported by the Russian Foundation for Humanities (grant no. 10-04-00125a).

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The task of the present paper is to (1) describe a short fragment of the semiotic conceptualization, i.e. to categorize and classify the somatic objects as they are presented in Russian and Body Russian. In classifying somatic objects, we (2) distinguish several semantic and functional groups of somatic objects and of their Russian names. These two problems form the first steps on the way to the complete inner typology of somatic objects and that of their language names. We (3) consider some distinctive features peculiar to corporeal sign units that help to classify somatic objects and their Russian names. Finally, as an example, we (4) present the semiotic conceptualization of one somatic object, namely the navel. 2

Somatic Objects and Their Classes

To produce the desired fragment of the semiotic conceptualization with different features of somatic objects in mind, we take into consideration the ability of somatic objects to form semantically and functionally uniform groups. These groups are of two types—biological pairs and semiotic pairs (these notions and terms are described below). It is well-known that many somatic objects exist separately, i.e. they have no pairs. Only body parts, parts of body parts and organs, and not other types of somatic objects (such as ­liquids, muscles, corporeal vessels, etc.) can be paired. The body itself exists separately and constitutes an exclusive class of somatic objects. It has many names in Russian; they are télo, kórpus, túlovishe, figúra, siluét, tórs and some others. These words are combined in different synonymic rows because they possess different semantic features. Thus, the Russian word korpus focuses on the unity of somatic objects within the body itself; the metaphorical meanings of this word prove it quite clearly. One can say arméjskij kórpus ‘army corps’, kórpus zdánija ‘building’, universitétskij kórpus ‘university building’, etc. On the other hand, the main assertive proposition in the semantic definition of the word túlovishe describes the so-called substantiality of the body. This fact explains the interchangeability of the words télo and túlovishe in the collocations ob’jóm téla and ob’jóm túlovisha (lit. ‘body volume’), which describe physical features of the body, and their nonequivalence in the expressions describing the beauty of the human body such as krasívoje télo ‘beautiful body’ vs. *krasívoje túlovishe. The word tors belongs to the art discourse; it is typical for the conversation of sculptors and painters and for the texts of fine art experts. The aesthetic characteristics of the human body are the primary constituents of the semantics of the word.

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Hands and arms, nostrils and ears, as well as some other somatic objects form biological pairs. That implies that they consist of two parts with similar structures and functions from anatomical and physiological points of view. However, not only visible somatic objects can be regarded as a biological pair. Heart, brain, kidneys and some other objects are invisible but they are conceptualized as united wholes. People learn that these objects are combined in pairs in the process of education: the information about these somatic objects is not perceptual, but intellectual, or cognitive. The important difference between the perceptual and cognitive biological pairs is that the first one belongs to the common, or naïve, semiotic picture of the world, whereas the second one belongs to the scientific presentation of the world. The so-called “people from the street” may not know that, for example, lungs or kidneys have two parts and that each part has its own name. This explains, by the way, why in everyday conversations the Russian words l’ókhkije (‘lungs’) and póchki (‘kidneys’) are used in the plural form much more often than their singular counterparts l’ókhkoje (‘lung’) and póchka (‘kidney’). The collocations lévoje/právoje l’ókhkoje (‘left/right lung’) or lévaja/právaja póchka (‘left/right kidney’) belong not to the kernel of the Russian language but to its medical sublanguage. Ordinary people name members of these pairs only in specific situations and cases, such as health checking procedures, diseases, physical damage and some other. While constructing the semiotic conceptualization of human body, one cannot confine oneself to the notion of a biological pair. “To be a biological pair” is a relation between the somatic objects, but it is necessary also to introduce and analyze the relation between their linguistic names. This derived relation is more complicated than the original one. We can say that the names of some biologically paired objects (and, metonymically, the objects themselves) constitute a semiotic pair, or that they are semiotically paired. Somatic objects that are biologically paired are considered to be semiotically paired3 if they satisfy the following conditions: (1) the standard name of the pair is in plural (cf. rúki ‘arms’, nógi ‘legs’, úshi ‘ears’); (2) each member of the pair has a name. This name may be of two kinds. It is either (a) a singular form of the name of the group (ruká ‘arm’, nogá ‘leg’, úkho ‘ear’) or (b) a collocation that consists of the singular form and the word denoting the spatial location of the member (i.e. somatic object) in relation to one of the two axis of the human body—vertical (more often) or horizontal 3 This notion was first introduced and discussed in detail in Kreydlin & Letuchiy 2006.

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(less often).4 For example, the collocations lévaja/právaja ruká (nogá, úkho) ‘left/right arm (leg, ear)’ are related to the vertical axis, and vérkhn’aja/nízhn’aja gubá ‘upper/lower lip’, vérkhneje/nízhneje véko ‘upper/lower eyelid’ name the somatic objects relatively to the horizontal axis; (3) both the name of the pair and the names of each member must belong to the lexicon of the everyday language, i.e. they are not terminological. The Russians know how to pronounce and spell these names; these words are pragmatically adapted, that is, people understand their morphological structure and know their meanings and usage. For example, Russians understand the phrases like ón—mojá právaja ruká ‘He is my right-hand man’, Já sdélaju éto odnój lévoj (rukój) ‘I’ll do it easily’ (lit. ‘I’ll do it with just my left (hand)),5 they know idioms like ruká ób ruku ‘hand in hand’ and comprehend cultural connotations of the word levshá ‘a left-handed person’. Semiotically paired somatic objects are well suited to express motions and actions of parallel or symmetrical character. Walking, sitting and standing, blinking (contrast to winking!), rubbing hands, applauding, closing eyes in sleeping and opening in awakening, tugging-of-war are carried out with both paired objects. In performing iconic gestures that demonstrate parallel objects, either abstract like geometrically parallel lines, or specific like rails or keys on a keyboard, we use both hands simultaneously. The natural generalization of the notion of a semiotic pair is the notion of a complex somatic group. Somatic objects such as fingers, toes, teeth, bones, etc., which exist in quantity of more than two, make up natural somatic groups also because of their similar structures and functions. Let us consider one example. Each finger on each hand has its own functions and linguistic names. The forefinger and the little finger participate, for example, in pointing, but the origin of their names is different: the forefinger has got another name, index finger, by its function, whereas the little finger is called so by its size. In Russian the word mizínets ‘little finger’ dates back to the old name of the youngest son in a family; it is therefore a metonymic name. The English people call the finger on which they wear a wedding ring the ring finger. This name is formed by the function. But in spite of the difference between functions, forms, names, etc., all fingers participate jointly in the most important actions of the hand—like holding and grabbing some relatively small objects or clenching in a fist. A fist 4 For the ordinary Russian language the sagittal axis is much less significant than the two other axes, but in the medical sublanguage it can also play an important part, cf. collocations perédn’aja resp. zádn’aja sténka zhelúdka ‘anterior resp. posterior wall of the stomach’. 5 Cf. the English obsolete idiom to work with the left hand ‘to work negligently,’ which corresponds to the Russian rabótatj spust’á rukavá (lit. ‘to work with the sleeves rolled down’).

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symbolizes the unity of the fingers of one hand, and, more generally, the unity of many other sorts. Forming a biological or semiotic pair is obviously not the only relation between corporal objects. Here we shall consider some other associations that exist among various sorts of somatic objects. There are semantically defined groups that are interesting from linguistic and semiotic points of view. Some of these groups, e.g. limbs, embrace semiotically paired objects such as arms and legs, some of them embrace several complex somatic groups, e.g. the Russian word pál’tsy may refer to two different sorts of objects: pál’tsy rúk ‘fingers’ (lit. ‘pál’tsy on the hands’) and pál’tsy nóg ‘toes’ (lit. ‘pal’tsy on the feet’). The word litsó ‘face’ may denote the corporal object that is regarded as a unity of complex somatic groups that are placed on the face. In the sentence Ejó litsó vyrazhálo ustálost’ ‘Her face looked tired’ the word litsó embraces several sorts of corporal objects and several somatic groups: eyes, lips, cheeks, etc. Thus, we have several sorts of somatic objects that are formed on different grounds: a somatic object itself; that means it is not a paired object. The examples of such objects are head, nose (not nostrils!), tongue and navel. The latter will be discussed in details below in the part 4. a semiotic pair (the distinctive features of this group are the commonality of names and the quantity of their referents); a complex somatic group (formed on the basis of the functional commona­ lity and the quantity of the members of the group); a unity of complex somatic groups and/or somatic objects (formed on the basis of the relation of inclusion as well as of the interpretation of semantics of the names). This list is not a complete description of all the semiotically relevant combinations of the somatic objects. There are some other linguistic expressions that show the possibility of integration of several objects and their inclusion in the same class. These classes are often called sistémy ‘systems’, cf. imúnnaja ­sistéma ‘immune system’, pishevarítel’naja sistéma ‘digestive system’, dykhátel’naja ­sistéma ‘respiratory system’, and the most well-known system (according to the data of the Russian National Corpus) is nérvnaja sistéma ‘nervous system’. The corporal systems combine functionally close somatic objects, though generally these objects are structurally and physically different. Note that not all of such classes are called sistémy in Russian. There are collocations like polovýje órgany ‘sex organs’, or genitálii ‘genitals’, skelét ‘skeleton’, sosúdy ‘vessels’, nérvy ‘nerves’. Some other somatic unities are combined on the basis of their physical properties. We mean the so-called types of somatic objects such as corporal liquids (blood, sweat, tears, etc.), gases, muscles, bones of different types, etc.

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Apart from semiotic pairs and complex somatic groups, the structural pro­ perties are common to some other unities of somatic objects. The examples of these unities are special places on the body (armpit, navel, groin, etc.), holes (nostrils, ears, mouth, anus, etc.), cuts and splits (wounds, scars, etc.). Finally, we will mention some interesting combinations of several kinds of somatic objects. These are so called vnéshnost’, or vnéshnij vid ‘appearance’ and vnútrennosti, which includes internal organs, some kinds of corporal liquids, fat, blood vessels. All the objects denoted by the word vnútrennosti are invi­ sible somatic objects within the body. Vnéshnost’ differs from vnútrennosti: it is a complex entity that stresses the outside impression of a person, first of all, his/her face, neck, shoulders, bosom, hair, combined with the quality of the skin, the color of the hair and the eyes, etc., together with such attributes as clothes, accessories, hairstyle, etc. The word vnéshnost’ is semantically close to the word óblik. These Russian words are contextually synonymous, but óblik as opposed to vnéshnost’ makes salient the contours of the face and the body. 3

Somatic Objects, Their Names and Corporeal Signs

There are gestures (in a broader sense of the word) that can be distinguished due to the groups of somatic objects that are active in performing them. The somatic object is called active organ in the gesture performance if this object (or its part) is considered the main tool of producing the gesture. Gestures of the given body language are usually called by the name of the active organ. Thus, there are gestures of hands, legs, shoulders, etc. But the gestures produced with one hand usually differ from the gestures of two hands. That means that one should distinguish gestures performed with one active organ from gestures performed with several (as a rule, paired) active organs. Here is one example. The handshake is typically performed with one active organ, which is the hand, but sometimes people grab at the partner’s stretched hand with both hands, and just in that case this gesture has two active organs. The latter gesture also belongs to the types of handshakes but its meaning is different. It is emotionally burdened, it is warmer than a usual handshake, it often expresses the happiness of meeting the interlocutor (the emotional handshake of greeting) or the feeling of gratitude for something good that has occurred with the assistance of the interlocutor (the emotional handshake of gratitude). There are gestures that have no variants of this sort. For example, the hug is normally performed only with two hands and two arms. Our handshake example describes the situation when the two gestures belong to the same type—gestures of handshake. The following example

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presents a case when two gestures similar in their form and structure are ­members of different types. If a person cannot hear properly the words addressed to him/her, (s)he puts his/her hand behind the ear with the palm oriented towards the speaker. This gesture, if produced with one active organ, is a silent request to the partner to speak louder now. Another gesture that has a similar form but quite a different meaning is produced with two active hands. We imply the childish dazzling gesture. A child places two hands behind the ears and moves them towards the speaker. In doing this, the gesturer shows that the addressee is a bit silly. The gesture corresponds to the Russian idiom khlópat’ ushámi (lit. ‘to flap the ears’) that has approximately the same mea­ ning. There are also the gestures of legs opposed in the same way: tópatj nogój ‘to stamp with one’s foot’ is the gesture of anger, while tópatj nogámi ‘to stamp with one’s feet’ is typical of the behavior of the nervous or capricious children. Of course, not only so-called proper gestures can form the opposition considered. Such postures as to stand on one foot and to stand on both feet, as well as to stand on one’s knee and to stand on one’s knees, and some others transfer different ideas. We may resume that many gestures can be ordered and classified in accordance with the body parts or organs that take part in performing them. 4

Navel: Semiotic Conceptualization

The somatic object which is usually called in Russian pupók (пупок, ‘пупок’) has never been investigated before. In constructing the semiotic conceptualization of any somatic object one should solve the following problems: (A) to discover and describe the formal and semantic similarities and diffe­ rences, which are pertinent to the object investigated; (B) to give a semantic description of the structural, physical and functional features of the object; (C) to state the general regularities and concrete rules that govern the usage of the somatic object. The material and results, which are presented here, are highly connected with the series of works that were devoted to different somatic objects (Arkadiev 2002; Kreydlin Kadykova 2009; Kreydlin, Letuchiy 2004; Kreydlin, Letuchiy 2010; Kreydlin, Pereverzeva 2009). While describing the navel we tried to reflect not only the properties of the object and the linguistic features of its name. We also fix some cultural

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aspects that are important for understanding all these properties and descri­ bing the rules of usage of the word pupók in different kinds of texts, both oral and written. The typical feature of Russian is that most of somatic objects have different names. Besides some names are constant and others vary under different factors, such as age, sex, processes, way of living, etc. For example, the word golová (голова) ‘head’ is the typical name for an adult person, but not for a very young child. For this body part a woman and a child, but not a man have the name golóvka (головка) which is a diminutive form of golová. As for the word pupók ‘navel’, it remains constant during the human lifespan and is applied to men, women, children, etc. The description of the word pupók ‘navel’ is based on literal texts of the 19th and 20th centuries, on many Russian dictionaries, cf. Efremova 2000; Evgenieva 2009; Kuznetsov 1998; Ozhegov 1990; Ushakov 1948, and on texts taken from Ruscorpora (www.ruscorpora.ru) and other corpora. As to Russian gestures connected with navel (quite a few) they are associated mostly with childish behavior. This thesis will be illustrated below. The word pupók ‘navel’ has several synonyms with different stylistic cha­ racteristics. There are a formal and bookish word pup (пуп) ‘belly-button’ and a scientific, more medical, word pupovína (пуповина) ‘navel cord. It also has two types of reference: it may be perceived as ‘a part of belly’ or as ‘spot on the belly’, see the examples (1) and (2): (1) Он поправил на животе расстегнувшуюся рубаху, из которой выглядывал полный живот с крупным пупком (А. Проханов. Господин Гексоген). Ón poprávil na zhivoté rasstegnúvshuyusya rubáhu, iz kotóroy vyglyádyval  pólny zhivót s krúpnym pupkóm. (A. Prokhánov. Gospodín Geksogén). ‘He set the unbuttoned shirt straight, showing the stout bow with a big navel’ (A. Prokhanov. Mister Hexogen). (2) У меня болит вот здесь,—он показал на пупок—в самой серёдке! U menyá bolít vot zdes—on pokazál na pupók—v sámoy seryódke. ‘I feel a pain here—he pointed his navel—right in the middle!’6 Pupók is not a unique word which refers to places: it shares this property with many Russian words, such as sólnechnoye spleténie (солнечное сплетение) 6 Examples without reference come from the notes of common talks made by the authors of the article during the research.

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‘solar plexus’, zatýlok (затылок) ‘nape’, lozhbínka (ложбинка) ‘suture’ etc. So the word pupók ‘navel’ can be conceptualized both as a body part and as a place on a human’s body.

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Pupók ‘navel’ has several salient structural features that account for some uses of its name. The first one is its perceptual visibility. One can observe the object easily, usually the navel of others if it is not covered with clothes. The second one is its wholeness: navel cannot be divided into linguistically conventionalized parts. This feature distinguishes the navel from some other body parts, for example, fingers include such somatic objects as knuckles and nails. The third one is that navel is a homogenous object. That means that the navel has no any salient parts. It is perceived as a folded and convex piece of skin puffed out from the belly. It is situated in the centre of the belly.

⸪

The shape of the navel appears to be one of two different types. First, a navel seems to look like a circular object, which is raised slightly above the belly. Feeling that something is wrong and asymmetrical with the shape, small child­ ren often press the navel trying to make the belly flat. It is a sort of a game that kids make with many somatic objects, not only with navel, i.e. with noses, ears, etc. Second, navel has a hollow. Both aspects of the form can be described in Russian as oválny (овальный) ‘oval’ or krúgly (круглый) ‘round’: (3) Шпрехт любил ее [Варин] живот, на полюсе которого торчал круглый, как пуговица, пупок (Г. Щербакова. У ног лежачих женщин). Sprecht lyubíl yeyó [Várin] zhivót, na pólyuse kotórogo torchál krúgly, kak púgovitsa, pupók (G. Sherbakóva. U nog lezháshih zhénshchin). ‘Schprect loved her [Varya’s] belly with a round button of navel on the top’ (G. Sherbakova. By the feet of the lying women). Kids measure the depth of the hollows of their navels too; doing this they insert fingers into the hollow. There are special Russian expressions that describe different aspects of the shape and texture of the navel. Some of them focus on its hollowness, e.g. glubóky

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pupók (глубокий пупок) ‘deep navel’, meaning ‘deep hollow’; others stress the upper surface of the navel, e.g. výpukly pupók (выпуклый пупок) ‘outie navel’, skládchaty pupók (складчатый пупок) ‘folded navel’. Note that the Russian explanatory dictionaries mention only one shape of the navel; perhaps, in doing this, they express only the main configuration of the object. This shape is a hollow, for example, the basic dictionaries of mo­dern Russian contain the following explication of the meaning: “Navel—a small hollow in the middle of the belly”. The explications of meaning correspond to the ordinary usages of the word. The scientific (anatomical, physiological, medical) definition is quite diffe­rent. Specialists in these sciences pay primary attention to other features of the navel, mainly its texture and inner structure. The thing is, that navel has many biological and medical influences to and correspondences with other parts of body and corporal diseases. For example, we can find the following description of the navel in one Russian medical book: “From the outside the navel is a skin cicatrix . From the inner side it is part of the visceral fascia—the fibrous membrane, which covers muscles, tendons, inner organs, vases and nerves” (Doletskiy, Isakov 1970: 577). This description demonstrates that biologists and doctors pay more attention to the inner structure of the navel. It is important for them that the navel is a membrane which covers muscles, internal organs and nerves. That means that the navel serves as a means of protecting internal organs, those which are vitally important for human health and life. This description coexists with the linguistic description but has a different sphere of application. It is applied for medical practices including medical research, medical diagnosis and treatment. But it can be also of help for so-called folk practitioners—those who do not belong to the professional body of doctors but try to treat ordinary people. That’s why the great majority of Russian examples that we have collected embrace the domain of folk medicine and talk about massage, childbirth, self-diagnosis, etc.

⸪

As for physical features of the navel, one of the most significant is its insufficiency/redundancy. We talk about the insufficiency and redundancy of some property, for example, the insufficiency or redundancy of moisture in hands, in bodies. The adjective suhóy (сухой) ‘dry’ has at least three meanings: suhíe rúki (сухие руки) ‘dry hands’ expressing a lack of moisture; suháya starúshka (сухая старушка ‘withered old lady’) means a lack of vitality; suhóy chelovék (сухой человек) ‘dried-up man’ may mean a lack of emotion.

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Suhóy pupók (сухой пупок) ‘dry navel’ refers only to the lack of moisture but móknushy pupók (мокнущий пупок) expresses not only the physical pro­ perty of the navel ‘wet navel’. It denotes the special disease as well. This collo­ cation has an idiomatic translation into English—the weeping umbilicus. We assert that both collocations should be reflected in any Russian explanatory dictionary. The disease mentioned is peculiar to newborn children. The weeping umbilicus is a kind of inflammation of the navel area, which is caused by redundant liquid accumulating in the navel. The usual method of treating it is drying the navel. But from the linguistic point of view, a dry navel is a corporal deficiency. That is why when the treatment is over and the child has recovered, he has a navel which is not dry but a normal one and no attention is paid to this feature of the object. We can generalize the idea about the linguistic collocations referring to deceases and some other physical troubles with somatic objects. Those collocations that refer to typical medical diseases or corporal anomalies should be included in dictionaries. These are such expressions as dry eye, running eyes, greasy hair, sticky hands and other word combinations.

⸪

One of the most interesting features peculiar to the navel is its diverse symbo­ lization in cultures. As has been shown in some works (Kreydlin 2002; Morris 2010; Grigorieva, Grigoriev, Kreydlin 2001) two types of somatic cultures are distinguished. The first one is called apophatic culture; it is the culture of body concealment. Another one is a culture of the body display, the culture of an open body. In earlier epochs in Europe apophatic culture was predominant but nowa­ days the second type of somatic culture prevails. Nowadays, those somatic objects which have not been assigned for demonstration are exposed widely for public observation. This tendency manifests itself in the openness of different parts of the human body in different situations and communicative acts. Mainly it concerns the female body because it often serves as an object of aesthetic pleasure. The navel belongs to those parts which are often open. The current female fashion for wearing short tops encourages the accentuation of the openness of the navel. However, one cannot say that the tendency to hide the navel has entirely disappeared, it is still preserved as the example (4) demonstrates: (4) Я придерживаюсь консерватизма в одежде. Большее, что могу себе позволить на работе—расстегнуть ворот рубашки. А ходить с голым

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пупком по коридорам государственных учреждений просто неприлично. Ya pridérzhivayus’ konservatízma v odéshde. Ból’sheye, chto mogú sebé pozvólit’ na rabóte—rasstegnút’ vórot rubáshki. A hodít’ s gólym pupkóm po koridóram gosudárstvennyh uchrezhdénij prósto neprilíchno. ‘I am conservative in clothing. When I am in the office I can only unbutton the collar of the shirt. But coming to the office (especially to the go­vernmental institution) with the opened navel is at least impolite’.

But the opposite direction of cultural thought also exists. The navel is regarded as a somatic object that embodies new aesthetic tastes. Those people who follow these cultural norms regard the navel as a beautiful object that should be exposed for observation. The speaker of (4) presents the old norm of covering the body, but a lot of people (especially teenagers) often expose the navel and don’t find it impolite or shameful. And despite they often hear the requests to cover the navel, they continue to show it because they find it beautiful and fashionable. One more tendency that touches not only the navel but some other body parts is the tendency to be decorated. Youngsters pierce these parts, make tatoos or insert some small objects into them. To decorate body parts helps to slightly mask their striking nakedness and to disguise their deficiencies. Thus the human body symbolization of the navel goes parallel to the process of body presentation. The processes of body openness, decoration and presentation in general date back to the rituals of highly remote cultures, both in time and space. The cultural traditions we are talking about have always been popular among some ethnic groups, particularly among American Indians. There is one fact we want to state particularly: there is a close connection between the navel of a child and his/her mother’s body. Russian has a special word pupovína (пуповина) ‘navel cord’, that denotes this connection more directly. The navel cord is the only somatic object that belongs to two bodies (if we leave aside the phenomenon of Siamese twins). Its topographic type is a link or a tube, which connects the two bodies, and its function is, according to Ushakov’s explanatory dictionary (Ushakov, 1948) “to transfer nurture from mother to the embryo”. However, although it is a highly important function that assists the baby to come into the world, doctors cut the navel cord and hence break the formal link between the closely connected bodies. The navel remains as the mark of the link and a symbol of a child birth. The importance of the action that is expressed with the special collocation obrézat pupovínu (обрезать пуповину) ‘to cut the navel cord’ is supported by the second derivative meaning of the same expression, i.e. to break the

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connection between people and organizations. This semantic proposition is not the only one in the semantic representation of the collocation; another proposition that must be included into its description relates to the fact that both persons linked with pupovína (пуповина) ‘navel cord’ become psychically independent and self-contained individuals. The trace in the form of navel that the navel cord leaves is a small wound that sometimes demands treatment. The procedure of this treatment is usually called zavyázyvanie pupká (завязывание пупка) ‘tying the navel’. Russians associate this procedure with the beginning of new life (cf.: Mazalova 2001: 37-39). The example (5) illustrates both technical and symbolical component of this procedure: (5) Я перекусываю пуповину, ребенок орет , а мать―улыбается: я  вижу, как удивительно расцветают, горят ее бездонные глаза синим огнем (М. Горький. Рождение человека). Ya perekúsyvayu pupovínu, rebyónok oryót , a mat’—ulybáetsa: ya vízhu, kak udivítel’no rascvetáyut, goryát yeyó bezdónnye glazá sínim ognyóm (M. Górky. Rozhdénie chelovéka). ‘I bite through a navel cord, a baby is crying but his mother is smi­ ling and I see how her bottomless eyes shine with blue light’. (M. Gorky. A human birth). 5 Conclusions The object of our investigation sphere was a somatic object that had previously been entirely ignored by linguists and nonverbal semioticians. The common Russian name of the object is pupók ‘navel’. To give the formal and semantic description of the somatic object and its name one must determine its place in the system of other corporeal objects and to describe its structural, physical and functional features. That is to construct the semiotic conceptualization of the object. Navel may denote either the human body part or the place on the human body. Among significant properties of the navel we have singled out its symbolic function that appears as a result of the real physical and psychological connection between two bodies: the mother’s and the child’s. The somatic object navel has several Russian names that underline diffe­ rent aspects or properties of the navel. Some of these names are stylistically neutral, others are stylistically marked. It has been shown that these names,

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though being synonyms, have some peculiar features. The word pupók ‘navel’ is a nucleus of a group of words that stress the significance of the body part they denote. One of the words that is included in the same synonymic row with the word pupók ‘navel’ is pup (пуп). This word is used generally within the collocation pup zemlí (пуп земли) ‘hub of the Universe’. This collocation characterizes the person as self-conceited, self-satisfied or, ironically, as the person who pre­ sents him/herself as worthy i.e. a highly important person. Besides, it emphasizes the symbolism of the navel and its confederates by its direct connection to certain mythological ideas. In many cultures the equivalent combinations denote the symbolical centre of the Universe. This type of symbolization is clearly manifested in the etymology. The word omphalos, another more scien­ tific and bookish name of the word navel, derives from the ancient Greek word, the name of the oracle in Delphi, who was considered the centre of the Universe.



References

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Author Index Abdulla, M. S.  280 Abinet S. G.  v, x, 4, 33, 34, 36, 40, 49 Abraham, R. C.  142, 147, 158 Ahmad, M.  165, 169, 171, 172, 176 Ahmed, K.  184, 192 Ahn, H. J.  272, 281 Aikhenvald, A. Y.  ii, ix, 26, 30, 199 Aitchison, J.  335, 353 Aksan, M.  62, 68, 225, 228, 256 Allan, K.  324, 330 Amante, D. G.  15, 30 Ameka, F. K.  3, 8, 200, 222, 286, 297, 305, 314 Andersen, E. S.  73, 96, 337, 353 Arkadiev P. M.  358, 364, 371 Arkadyev, P. M. see Arkadiev Assako a Tiati, F.  297 Athanasiadou, A.  140, 158 Awolaye, Y.  22, 30 Badawi, E.  317, 329, 330 Baker, M.  78, 96 Barcelona, A.  70, 281, 283, 355 Bargery, G. P.  142, 147, 158, 170, 176 Barsalou, L. W.  1, 8 Bartmiński, J.  141, 159 Basso, K.  93, 96 Będkowska-Kopczyk, A.  322, 328, 330 Berendt, E. A.  54, 68 Bergen, B.  1, 8 Berhanu C.  47, 49 Bermudez, J. L.  140, 159 Binyam S. M.  34, 49 Blake, B. J.  47, 49 Boers, F.  353, 354 Boot, I.  194 Boroditsky, L.  192 Bouquiaux, L.  200, 222 Bowden, J.  17, 30 Bowerman, M.  291, 297 Boyd, R.  201, 222 Brenzinger, M.  iii, v, x, 1, 2, 8, 29, 223, 260, 298 Brinton, L. J.   180, 192 Brown, C. H.  73, 96, 337, 354 Brugman, C.  17, 30

Burridge, K.  324, 330 Bybee, J. L.  2, 8, 16, 30, 99, 100, 115 Cameron, D.  325, 331 Casad, E. H.  10 Casasanto, D.  186, 192 Chachage, C. S. L.  280 Chamo, I. Y.  144, 157, 159 Charteris-Black, J.  353, 354 Cienki, A.  163, 164, 176, 178, 192 Claudi, U.  8, 31, 49, 69, 115, 193, 200, 201, 222, 223, 272, 282, 298, 311, 312, 314 Cook, E. D.  72, 96 Croft, W.  35, 49, 119, 138 Csordas, T. J.  1, 8 Dalrymple, H. R.  9, 70 Dasher, R. B.  2, 10 Davies, M.  123, 124, 138 Debela G. A.  30, 34, 49 Deignan, A.  8, 54, 58, 68, 337, 346, 348, 353–355 Desta T. W.  39, 49 Di Carlo, P.  297 Diadori, P.  175, 176 Diez, O. I.  349, 350, 354 Diller, J.  297 Dimmendaal, G. J.  30, 305, 314 Dirven, R.  9, 68, 70, 192, 193, 256–259, 283, 354 Dixon, R. M. W.  ii, 301, 314 Doherty, A.  135, 136, 138 Doke, C. M.  24, 30 Dorvlo, K.  22, 30 Durrant, P.  135, 136, 138 Duszak, A.  69 Edgerton F.  98, 115 Eilan, N.  159 Eitan, Z.  186, 192 Elias, D. L.  38, 49 Enfield, N. J.  ii, 1, 8, 28, 30, 54, 68, 73, 97, 135, 138, 263, 269, 282, 331, 358, 371 Erman, B.  28, 30 Essien, O. E.  21, 23, 30

374 Evans, N.  2, 8 Evans-Pritchard, E. E.  200, 222 Evgenieva, A. P.  365, 371 Fallon, R.  135, 139 Fangfang, W.  336, 354 Fauconnier, G.  188, 192 Fehn, A.  2, 8, 221, 223, 298 Ferguson, C. A.  329, 331 Firth, J. R.  122, 138 Fletcher, R. S.  170, 176 Foolen, A.  225, 256 Forceville, C.  178, 192, 194, 195 Frank, R. M.  1, 10, 259, 349, 354 Frauwallner E.  98, 115 Gaby, A.  54, 63, 68, 225, 256 Gardner, D.  123, 124, 138 Gebreyes, A. S. see Abinet S. G. Geeraerts, D.  9, 63, 68, 121, 138, 139, 225, 257, 337, 354 Getachew H.  45, 49 Gevaert, C.  225, 257 Gibbs, R. W. Jr  1, 8, 59, 68, 176, 178, 192, 194, 354 Giessner, S. R.  194 Goddard, C.  225, 257 Goldenberg, G.  46, 49, 51 Golla, V.  83, 96 González, R. A.  353, 354 Good, J.  285, 297 Goossens, L.   56, 68 Górska, E.  vi, x, 6, 9, 69, 177, 178, 184, 188, 192, 282 Grady, J. E.  180, 181, 182, 193 Granger, S.  355 Greco, S.  337, 353, 354 Greenberg, J. H.  24, 30, 35, 49, 96, 353 Gries, S. Th.  8, 69, 126, 139, 354, 355 Grigoriev, N. V.  368, 372 Grigorieva, S. A.  368, 372 Grondelaers, S.  63, 68 Gutt, E. H. M.  39, 41, 42, 45, 49 Hamm, C.  285, 297 Hampe, B.  181, 193 Hanks, P.  262, 282 Haruna, A.  21, 30 Heath, J.  23, 30

author index Heine, B.  v, x, 2, 3, 4, 8, 10, 13–18, 20, 23–25, 30–37, 39, 40, 43, 44, 48–50, 52, 68, 69, 73, 75, 76, 82–84, 86, 96, 100–102, 105, 106, 115, 120, 138, 141, 154, 159, 177, 179, 180, 193, 199, 200, 208, 214, 219, 220, 222, 265 268, 272, 282, 284, 285, 288, 290, 292, 298 Henderson, W.  352, 354 Henley, N.  326, 331 Henok W.  34, 50 Hetzron, R.  41–45, 47, 49, 50 Hewitt, G.  3, 8 Hilpert, M.  8, 63, 69, 343–345, 352, 354 Hiraga, M.  193, 225, 258 Hombert, J.  285, 298 Hopper, P. J.  16, 31 Hübler, A.  164, 165, 176 Hudson, G.  41, 50 Hünnemeyer, F.  8, 31, 49, 69, 115, 193, 222, 282, 298 Hussein, M. M.  39, 40–42, 45, 49 Hyman, L.  298, 311, 314 Ibarretxe-Antuñano, I.  213, 222, 225, 257 Idstrom, A.  97 Ikegami, Y.  225, 257 Johns, T.  338, 355 Johnson, C.  182, 193 Johnson, F.  265, 282 Johnson, M.  1, 9, 15, 31, 54, 65, 69, 87, 96, 99, 116, 152, 159, 177, 178, 180, 181, 183, 189, 190, 193, 199, 222, 225, 228, 254, 257, 260, 282 Jordan-Diller, K.  297 Junaidu, I.  156, 159, 174 Jurewicz, J.  v, xi, 4, 98, 100–102, 104–106, 115 Kadykova, A. G.  364, 372 Kafin-Hausa, A. U.  159 Kahigi, K. K.  281 Kamati ya Bunge  280 Kapeliuk, O.   44, 50 Keith, A. B.  98, 115 Kendon, A.  358, 371 Kezilahabi, E.  280 Khesed, L. A.  vii, xi, 7, 357 Kibao, A. S.  280 King’ei, K. G.  270, 273 Kirk, G. S.  115, 116 Klerk, de V.  325, 331

375

author index Koch, P.  120, 138 Koller, V.  353, 354 König, C.  25, 31 Koptjevskaja-Tamm, M.  73, 95, 96, 119, 138 Kövecses, Z.  1, 9, 15, 28, 31, 54, 63, 69, 185, 193, 336, 347, 355 Krapf, L.  265, 282 Kraska-Szlenk, I.  iii–v, ix, xi, 1, 2, 4, 6, 8–10, 29, 49, 52–54, 56, 58, 61, 65, 66, 69, 224, 260, 270, 282 Kreydlin, G. E.   vii, xi, 7, 357, 358, 360, 364, 368, 371, 372 Krzeszowski, T. P.  181, 193 Kulick, D.  325, 331 Kuteva, T.  2, 8, 16, 31, 33, 48, 50, 52, 69, 75, 96, 100, 115, 177, 179, 180, 193 Kuznetsov, S. I.  365, 372 Kwon, Y. J.  272, 281 Lagae, C. R.  201, 213, 222 Lakoff, G.  1, 9, 15, 31, 54, 65, 69, 87, 96, 99, 116, 137, 139, 152, 159, 178, 180–183, 188–190, 193, 194, 199, 222, 225, 228, 250, 253, 254, 257, 260, 282 Langacker, R. W.  15, 31, 180, 194 Lau, T. C.  8 Leech, G.  135, 139 Lehmann, C.  16, 31, 47, 50 Lenselaer, A.  265, 282 Leslau, W.  37–42, 44–46, 50 Letuchiy, A. B.  358, 360, 364, 371, 372 Levin, M.  336, 347–350, 353, 355 Lewis, M. P.  285, 298 Lindquist, H.  336, 347–350, 353, 355 Lovegren, J.  297 Łykowska, L.  34, 50 Ma Newman, R.  150, 159 Maalej, Z.  vi, xii, 1, 6, 9, 53, 54, 60, 64, 69, 70, 178, 179, 194, 224, 225, 228, 242, 249, 254, 256–259 Macdonell, A. A.  98, 116 Madan, A. C.  265, 282 Majid, A.  73, 97, 282 Mandler, J. M.  180, 194 Marcel, A.  159 Marmaridou, S.  225, 258 Marzio, C.  280 Matsuki, K.  54, 70

Mazalova, N. E.  370, 372 Mbolifouye, F.  201, 202, 223 McDonough, J.  79, 97 McEnery, T.  261, 282, 356 McNeill, D.  164, 176, 358, 372 McPherron, P.  1, 9, 13, 31 McPherson, L.  54, 70 Merlo Pick, V.  265, 282 Meunier, F.  355 Meyer, R.  37, 41, 51 Mithun, M.  72, 78, 80, 97 Mkapa, B. W.  281 Mohamed, S. A.  281 Mohamed, S. M.  281 Moltmann, F.  142, 143, 159 Morgan, W.  78, 83, 97 Morris, D.  175, 176, 368, 372 Morrow, P. R.  237, 258 Msekwa, P.  281 Mtobwa, R. B.  281 Muhammed, A.  159 Muhando, P.  281 Müller, A.  163, 176, 178, 184, 188–190 Müller, C.  192, 194 Müller, F.  217, 223 Mulokozi, M. M.  281 Mung’ong’o, C. G.  281 Mvee, J. P.  297 Nagai, T.  225, 258 Narayan, S.  8 Ndalu, A. E.  270, 273, 282 Newman, J.  v, xii, 5, 97, 119, 138 Newman, P.  18, 19, 31, 143, 144, 147, 149, 154, 155, 159, 282 Nguanguep, C.  297 Niemeier, S.  9, 54, 68, 70, 225, 227, 228, 256–259, 269, 283 Nissen, U. K.  225, 258, 352, 355 Oberlies T.  98, 116 Occhi, D. J.  60, 70, 225, 258 O’Dowd, E.  212, 223 Oldenberg, H.  98, 116 Olofson, H.  169–172, 176 Owen, W. J.  9, 70 Owens, J.  212, 223 Ozhegov, S. I.  365, 372

376 Pagliuca, W.  8, 30 Pasch, H.  vi, xii, 2, 6, 199, 201–203, 223 Pawlak, N.  v, xii, 5, 69, 140, 144, 152, 159, 176 Pecher, D.  194 Pederson, E.  291, 297 Peisert, M.  322, 326, 327, 331 Peña Cervel, S.  269, 283 Pereverzeva, S. I.  vii, xiii, 7, 357, 364, 372 Perkins, R. D.  8, 30 Perlman, M.  178, 192 Perry, J.  140, 159 Pexman, P. M.  9, 70 Pfau, R.  14, 31 Phillips, W.  192 Piirainen, E.  97 Piqué-Angordans, J.  353, 355 Potter, L.  8, 54, 58, 68, 346, 348, 352, 354 Prokhorov, K.  54, 70 Radden, G.  x, 9, 31, 69, 282, 336, 355 Radić-Bojanić, B.  341, 355 Ramanathan, V.  1, 9, 13, 31 Raven, J. E.  116 Raz, S.  38, 41, 42, 46, 51 Reh, M.  23, 31 Reichard, G.  78, 97 Rice, K.  72, 79, 97 Rice, S.  v, xiii, 4, 71, 79, 82, 83, 97, 132, 138 Richter genannt Kemmermann, D.  vi, xiii, 7, 21, 299 Rieschild, V. R.  61, 70 Rohrer, T.  1, 9 Roynane, C. J.  159 Rubin, A. D.  34, 43, 44, 51 Rychlý, P.  127, 138, 139 Sacleux, C.  265, 283 Sapir, E.  76, 78, 80, 93, 97 Schladt, M.  20, 31 Schofield, M.  116 Schubert, T. W.  194 Schuh, R. G.  147, 148, 159 Scott, M.  338, 355 Semin, G. R.  8, 256, 258 Semino, E.  191, 194 Serzisko, F.  311, 312, 314 Shaaban, R.  281 Shabalov, N. P.  372

author index Sharifian, F.  1, 3, 9, 53, 54, 60, 64, 66, 68–70, 225, 256–259, 269, 280, 283 Shimizu, K.  305, 314 Siahaan, P.  9, 53, 54, 70, 225, 227, 259, 341, 342, 345, 346, 355 Siakaluk, P. D.  1, 9, 62, 70 Silaški, N.  341, 355 Skorczyńska, H.  337, 353, 355 Smith, E. R.  8, 256, 258 Snoek, C.  72, 97 Song, K.  43, 44, 48, 50 Stearns, J.  9, 70 Steere, E.  281 Stefanowitsch, A.  8, 69, 126, 139, 353–355 Steinbach, M.  14, 31 Stojanovic, D.  8 Stolz, T.  13, 31 Stubbs, M.  135, 139 Svorou, S.  2, 3, 9, 17, 32, 40, 52, 70, 199, 200, 207, 208, 213, 223 Sweetser, E. E.  2, 9 Szczygłowska, T.  vii, xiii, 7, 335 Tabakowska, E.  140, 158 Talmy, L.  207, 223 Tanita, K.  54, 68 Timmers, R.  186, 192 Tippu, T.  281 Tognini-Bonelli, E.  261, 283 Tono, Y.  282 Tosco, M.  19, 32 Traugott, E. C.  2, 8, 10, 16, 31, 32, 49, 115, 180, 192, 282 Tucker, A. N.  201, 223 TUKI  265, 283 Turner, M.  188, 192, 194, 250, 257 Ukosakul, M.  10 Underhill, J. W.  141, 159 Urios-Aparisi, E.  178, 192, 194, 195 Ushakov, D. N.  365, 369, 372 Vaghi, F.  353, 356 Vainik, E.  59, 70, 225, 259 Van Dantzig, S.  194 Van Staden, M.  73, 97, 282 Vanden Plas, V. H.  201, 213, 222 Venuti, M.  353, 356

377

author index Viberg, A.  2, 10 Voigt, R.  35, 44, 45, 48, 51 Voll, R.  vi, xiv, 6, 7, 284, 285, 297, 298 Vorbichler, A.  25, 32

Witzel, M.  98, 116 Wolff, E.  23, 32 Wołk, E.  70 Wynn, L.  326, 331

Walters-York, L. M.  352, 356 Warren, B.  28, 30 Watters, J. R.  268, 298 Werner, A.  269, 283 Wheeler, K.  8 Widłak, S.  318, 331 Wiechmann, D.  122, 139 Wierzbicka, A.  1, 8, 10, 28, 30, 54, 59, 68, 70, 135, 139, 199, 203, 223, 269, 282, 283 Wijnen, J.  194 Wikberg, K.  353, 356 Wilhelm, A.  72, 96 Wilkins, D.  2, 8, 40, 73–75, 85, 89, 97, 120, 129, 139 Will, I.  vi, xiv, 5, 163, 165, 169, 171, 172, 176 Wilson, A.  261, 282, 356

Xiao, R.  282 Yahya, S. S.  281 Yakasai, H. M.  145, 159 Yoon, K. J.  225, 259 Young, R.  78, 83, 97 Yri, K. M.  35, 51 Yu, N.  xii, 1, 9, 10, 53, 54, 59, 64, 68, 70, 178, 179, 185, 194, 203, 204, 223, 225, 228, 256–259, 283 Zanolie, K.  183, 197 Zawrotna, M.  vi, xiv, 7, 316 Zbikowski, L. M.  178, 185–189, 191, 194 Ziemke, T.  1, 10, 259 Zlatev, J.  1, 10

Language Index !Xun  24, 25, 31 Abhaz  3 Afroasiatic (Afro-Asiatic)  4, 5, 18, 19, 21, 23, 50, 159 Amharic  x, 33–51, 61, 70 Apache  93 Arabic  xiv, 37, 54, 58–61, 154, 201, 224, 226, 248, 257, 317, 318, 324, 329 Egyptian  vi, 6, 7, 316, 317, 330 Tunisian  vi, 54, 60, 69, 224, 225, 236, 257 Argobba  33, 34, 37, 41, 43–46, 50 Athapaskan  v, xiii, 4, 71–73, 75–79, 82, 83, 85, 88, 90, 91, 93, 94–97 Australian languages  2, 8, 66 Bantu  xiii, 24, 260, 269, 283, 286, 298 Beboid  xiv, 284, 285, 297, 298 Buu  285, 286 Chadic  xii, 5, 18, 19, 21, 23, 154, 159 Chaha  34, 37, 39–42, 45, 46, 48 Chinese  10, 54, 59, 70, 185, 194, 223, 224, 259, 341 Dene Sųłiné (Chipewyan)  v, 71, 72, 74, 76, 79, 81, 83, 84, 86, 88, 91–93, 97 Dhaasanac  19, 20, 32 Dobbi  34, 38, 41, 42, 45 Efik  21 Endegeň  34, 42, 45 English  v, x, xii, xiii, 5–8, 13, 14, 27, 28, 49, 53, 54, 56, 58–63, 66–68, 70, 86, 119, 121–124, 128, 131, 136, 138, 139, 142, 143, 145, 146, 157–159, 164, 174–176, 181, 193–195, 202, 221, 224–227, 234, 246, 249, 257–259, 265, 282, 317, 319, 321, 322, 325, 327, 329, 352, 354, 355, 356, 361, 368 American  123, 138, 143 Australian  40, 66 Estonian  59, 70, 224, 259 Ethiosemitic  v, x, 33, 34, 38–43, 45–47, 49, 51 Ewe  3, 8, 200, 222, 297, 305, 314

Gafat  34, 37, 41, 42 Ge’ez  37–42, 45 Gurduŋ  21, 30 Harari  34, 35, 37, 41, 46, 47, 50 Hausa  v, vi, xii, xiv, 5, 18, 19, 31, 140, 141, 143–147, 150, 152–159, 163, 165–170, 172, 174–176 Hupa  83, 96 Ibibio  23, 30 Inor  34, 42, 49 Jukunoid  xiii, 299, 305, 314 Khoeid  2 Kistane  34, 38–42, 45, 48 Kordofanian  23 Koyra Chiini  22, 23, 30 Koyukon  78, 80, 81, 96 Krongo  23, 31 Kwa  22, 30 Lamang  23, 32 Logba  22, 30 Mamvu  25, 26, 32 Manambu  26, 30 Mäsqan  34, 37, 42, 45 Mbembe  vi, xiii, 7, 299–301, 303, 305, 308, 310, 312, 313 Muher  34, 37, 41, 42, 45 Mundabli  vi, xiv, 6, 284, 285, 286, 288, 292, 298 Navajo  83, 94, 97 Ndu  26 Niger-Congo  21–24, 201, 285 Nilo-Saharan  15, 23, 25, 49 Oromo  x, 15, 30, 41, 49, 212, 223 Persian  60, 61, 70, 224, 258 Polish  x, 53–56, 58–63, 65–67, 100, 164, 176, 317, 331

379

language index Russian  viii, xi, xiii, 7, 357–372 Sanskrit  5, 98, 104 Semitic  4, 34, 37, 45, 49–51 Silt’e  37–42, 45, 47 Songhai  23 Swahili  vi, xi, xiii, xiv, 6, 53–56, 58–61, 63, 65, 66, 68, 69, 201, 260–267, 270, 272, 273, 280–283 Tamil  54, 60, 61 Tigre  34, 35, 37, 38, 41, 42, 46–51 Tigrinya  33–35, 37, 41–45

Tsuut’ina (Sarsi)  94 Turkish  54, 60–62, 68, 224, 228, 256 Wolane  34, 37, 40–42, 45, 51 Yemne-Kimbi  xiv, 284, 285 Yoruba  22 Zande  vi, xii, 3, 6, 199–203, 208, 209, 212, 214, 217, 219, 220–223 Zay  34, 38, 40, 41, 45, 48 Zulu  2, 24, 30

Subject Index adposition  4, 18, 28–30, 33–35, 46, 47, 49, 75, 76, 85, 94, 180, 288, 298, 314 adverb  4, 18, 29, 33–35, 38, 39, 41, 42, 46–48, 72, 76, 127, 200, 202, 210, 211, 217, 286, 297, 311, 312, 314, 338, 347 affectedness  vi, 299, 301, 310, 312, 313 alienable possession  214, 288 animal body part terms udder  v, 5, 98, 101–114 anthropomorphic model  36, 39, 101, 114, 179 body part terms and body fluids (human) anus  36, 61, 74, 290, 295, 363 arm  vi, 5, 6, 40, 54, 63, 74, 93, 94, 119, 120, 123, 126, 127, 129, 131, 133–135, 137, 164, 172, 173, 184, 242, 244, 260, 261, 263–266, 272, 274–280, 295, 343, 360–363, 467 armpit  293, 295, 340, 363 back  4, 19, 20, 25–29, 33, 35–37, 39–42, 47, 48, 62, 67, 76, 93, 104, 108, 120, 128, 130, 149, 179, 181, 199, 200, 207, 211, 212, 214, 219, 220, 234, 258, 273, 290, 295, 311 belly  3, 4, 20, 28, 29, 37, 42, 45, 54, 76, 80, 91, 93, 199, 203, 204, 208, 209, 211, 218, 219, 258, 295, 365–367 bile  4, 28, 29, 76 blood  54, 63, 128, 170, 246, 293, 322, 349, 362, 363 brain  1, 8, 27, 194, 228, 233, 239, 254, 336, 341, 351, 360 buttocks  33, 36–39, 62, 91, 179, 214, 220, 290, 295 chest  4, 20, 58, 74, 89, 126, 128, 133–135, 137, 165, 172, 173, 186, 203, 372 ear  8, 28, 63, 75, 84, 86, 91, 126, 131, 132, 135, 163, 165, 174, 175, 292, 293, 295, 304, 324, 336, 360, 361, 363, 364, 366 elbow  244, 295 eye  viii, 3, 4, 7–9, 20, 27–29, 37, 39, 40, 52, 53, 59, 60–63, 70, 76, 81, 90, 93, 145, 163, 165, 166, 168–172, 175, 199, 200, 204–207, 209–212, 219, 224, 225, 234, 235, 257–259, 335, 336, 338–340, 343–346, 348, 349, 351–355, 361–363, 368, 370

face  3, 10, 15, 28, 29, 33, 36, 37, 39, 47, 52, 59, 63, 70, 75, 76, 126, 129–132, 144, 145, 149, 165, 258, 321, 327, 337, 348, 354, 357, 362 finger  2, 24, 25, 29, 63, 75, 90, 92, 119, 123, 129, 132, 133, 135, 136, 165, 173–175, 210, 244, 248, 250, 251, 263, 295, 361, 362, 366 foot  2, 24, 25, 26, 27, 29, 33, 39, 40, 42, 48, 62, 75, 76, 81, 82, 85, 89, 90, 91, 93, 179, 213, 263, 295, 353, 355, 364 forehead  3, 19, 54, 90, 93, 126–130, 200 genital  137–319, 327, 362 groin  363 hair  5, 59, 63, 72, 82, 119, 130–133, 135, 148, 233, 248, 264, 290, 312, 363, 368 hand  passim head  passim heart  3, 4, 21, 28, 29, 52, 54–58, 61, 65, 66, 68–72, 76, 78, 84, 86, 87, 88, 93, 96, 126, 144, 145, 156, 172, 199, 202–205, 207, 208, 219, 224, 225, 228, 237, 242, 246, 254, 256–259, 269, 283, 305, 342, 352, 360 hip  37, 41, 42, 47, 48, 126, 131, 132, 135, 136, 295 intestines  4, 28, 29, 61 kidney  93, 360 knee  5, 27, 29, 74, 76, 82, 126, 131, 132, 135, 137, 155, 295, 364 leg  39, 40, 57, 62, 63, 67, 74, 86, 90, 165, 173, 179, 213, 219, 263, 265, 295, 360–364 liver  3, 4, 28, 29, 42, 54, 61, 70, 76, 129, 225, 257, 259, 269, 305 lung  61, 360 mouth  vii, 3, 6, 7, 13, 14, 19, 20, 37, 41, 54, 60, 74, 82, 83, 85, 90, 92, 93, 126, 163, 165–167, 173, 175, 176, 210, 211, 213, 220, 249, 258, 287, 288, 290, 292, 295, 335, 336, 338–340, 346–348, 351–353, 355, 363 navel  vii, 7, 91, 357, 359, 362–371 neck  13, 14, 19, 40, 91, 134, 137, 291, 294, 295, 363 nose  vii, 7, 28, 74, 88, 92, 167, 282, 295, 335, 336, 338–340, 348–353, 355, 362, 366

381

subject index nostril  92, 360, 362 penis  74, 75, 317, 324, 329 rib  33, 37, 41, 42, 90 sex organs  362 skeleton  74, 90, 362 sole  33, 37, 42, 48, 75, 91, 307 stomach  3, 4, 27–29, 33, 37, 42–45, 48, 54, 61, 67, 76, 80, 90, 128, 145, 150, 156, 208, 225, 258, 295, 305, 361 sweat  65, 69, 310, 362 tears  345, 362 thumb  2, 24, 90, 163, 165, 174, 183, 349 tongue  27, 29, 76, 221, 362 vagina  329 waist  20, 37, 40, 41, 134, 137, 291, 295 case markers  29, 33, 47, 76, 94 categorization  1, 7, 96, 97, 124, 140, 153, 282, 337 cognition  ii, xii, xiii, 2, 6–8, 70, 115, 139, 178, 192, 194, 199, 200, 202, 204, 254, 256, 258, 259, 280, 282, 299, 301, 302, 336, 354, 358 collocate  119, 121–124, 126, 127, 130, 132, 135–137 collocation  14, 82, 86, 145, 317, 360, 368–371 collostructional analysis  124 comparatives  180 concept  13, 36, 37, 42, 47, 54–56, 58, 61, 87, 98–100, 103, 107, 110, 112–114, 121, 123, 140, 141, 143, 144, 148, 153, 154, 163–165, 168, 177, 179, 180, 182, 183, 185, 199, 200, 207, 208, 211, 214, 219, 220, 228, 237, 253, 267, 339–342, 346, 347, 349, 351 conceptual metaphor  10, 54, 64, 152, 178, 180, 181, 184, 186, 189, 191, 192, 227–230, 233–235, 238–244, 246–250, 253–255, 279 conceptual mapping  182 conceptual transfer  2–4, 14, 15, 17, 24, 28, 29, 75, 76, 179 conceptualization  v, vii, 1, 2, 5–7, 13, 15, 27, 28, 31, 52, 54, 56, 59, 65, 67, 70, 117, 141, 148, 154, 159, 163, 231, 233, 235, 239, 242, 243, 247, 256, 257, 259, 283, 335, 342, 351, 357–360, 364, 370–372 conditional markers  37 conjunction  15, 42, 47, 48, 136, 212 constructionalization  75, 76, 83, 84, 94 control  vi, 7, 27, 169, 181, 182, 183, 189, 190, 194, 204, 205, 206, 207, 215, 216, 226, 227,

247, 248, 252, 255, 258, 272, 273, 274, 275, 278, 279, 295, 299, 301, 308, 348 corpus-based approach  6, 8, 69, 119, 120, 137, 354, 355 cultural model  1, 6, 7, 52, 62–67, 228, 229, 236, 352–255 decategorialization  16–18, 22, 23, 26, 27 desemanticization  16–18, 21, 26 diglossia  329, 331 emblem  5, 164–167, 175 embodiment  iii, vi, xii, 1–3, 5, 8–10, 54, 62–64, 68–70, 138, 177, 178, 181, 184, 192, 194, 199, 224, 225, 258, 264, 272, 273 emotion  v, 3, 4, 6–10, 27–31, 52–63, 66, 68–73, 76, 83, 84, 86, 88, 95, 96, 120, 132, 140, 145, 152, 156–159, 165, 169, 175, 176, 199, 200, 202–207, 219, 223–225, 228, 233, 246, 256, 259, 264, 269, 270, 282, 283, 299, 301–309, 311, 314, 316, 317, 323, 326, 327, 342, 345, 347–349, 355, 363, 367 erosion  16–18, 23, 26 experiencer (perceiver)  56, 57, 152, 304–309   gesture  xi, 5, 6, 14, 133, 163–177, 184, 192, 264, 269, 279, 348, 349, 357, 358, 361, 363–365, 371, 372 grammaticalization  v, x, xi, xiii, 2–6, 8, 13, 14, 16–19, 21–23, 26, 27, 29, 31–35, 37–41, 43–48, 50, 52, 53, 68, 69, 73, 75–78, 94, 95, 99, 100, 114, 115, 120, 146, 177, 179, 180, 191, 200, 210, 212, 214–217, 219, 260, 270, 282, 284, 286, 288, 296 idiom  vi, 5, 28, 62, 63, 67, 84, 95, 163–165, 169, 171, 175, 226, 227, 361 image schema  6, 55, 62, 158, 177, 178, 180, 181, 183, 185, 186, 189, 190, 191, 193, 225, 234, 247 inalienable possession  202, 288 incorporation  v, 4, 71, 72, 76–78, 96, 97 initiation  vii, 299, 301, 304, 307, 308, 313 interfield & intrafield metaphoric shift  73, 74, 119, 120 landmark  34, 53, 179, 199, 200, 211, 213, 214, 219, 220, 228

382 lexicalization  v, 3, 4, 11, 71, 75, 77, 78, 88, 92, 94, 177, 179, 192, 217, 223 locative marker  294, 314 metaphor (also metaphorical)  passim metaphtonymy  56, 68 metonymy (also metonyms & metonymic)   mind  1, 8, 9, 10, 67, 69, 82, 86–88, 95, 104, 109, 112, 116, 132, 133, 144, 145, 151, 153, 159, 176, 182, 193, 194, 205–207, 218, 219, 224, 225, 230, 254, 257, 259, 278, 282, 305–309, 330, 335, 342, 345 multimodal  x, xiii, 3, 6, 177–180, 187, 188, 192, 194, 195 non-verbal communication  163, 169 numerals  2, 6, 14, 24–27, 29, 33, 75, 200, 202, 217 perception  2, 4, 7, 8, 10, 71, 72, 83, 95, 140, 141, 144, 148, 153, 178, 188, 193, 263, 299, 301–304, 309, 311, 316, 318, 322, 343, 345 polysemy  96, 100, 119, 129, 135–138, 158, 193, 371 possessor  13, 18, 19, 203, 285–287, 291–293, 311–313, 358 postpositions  6, 7, 19 prepositions  18, 19, 30, 33–35, 38–42, 46–48, 120, 124, 126, 127, 130, 131, 133, 134, 143, 147, 166, 200, 202, 209, 210–217, 223, 230, 244, 274, 286, 289, 297, 300, 341, 350

subject index reference identity  4, 14, 17, 20, 27, 29, 76 reflexive marker  20–23, 29, 75, 76, 154 reflexive pronoun  21, 30, 43, 45, 46, 48, 147 relative pronoun  68 self  v, 5, 8, 21–23, 43–45, 49, 56, 66, 86, 87, 117, 119, 129–135, 137, 138, 140–142, 144–159, 164, 206, 235, 244, 245, 276, 278, 311, 371, semantic range  112, 114 semantic role  301, 305, 313 soul  21, 33, 43–46, 48, 144, 150, 154, 156, 233 source concept  3, 33, 37, 100, 105, 110, 113, 179, 182, 335, 340 spatial orientation  4, 14, 17, 28, 29, 75, 76, 199, 268, 269, 279 subordinator  4, 33, 34, 37, 46–48, 221 taboo  xiv, 7, 61, 62, 316, 318–324, 326–328, 330, 331 target concept  4, 29, 60, 76, 93, 100, 177, 179, 180, 182, 183 temporal marker  37, 38 unidirectionality (of metaphor mapping)  2, 179, 180 verbs of perception  2, 10, 302, 303 zoomorphic model  5, 6, 36, 39, 101, 102, 104, 106–108, 110, 111, 114, 179, 213