Behavioral and Brain Sciences
- Behavioral and Brain Sciences / Volume 31 / Issue 05 / October 2008, pp 509- 511
- Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008
- DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X08005001 (About DOI), Published online: 01 October 2008
Open Peer Commentary
Language is shaped by the body
Mark Aronoffa1, Irit Meira2, Carol Paddena3 and Wendy Sandlera4
a1 Department of Linguistics, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY 11979-4376 mark.aronoff@stonybrook.edu http://www.linguistics.stonybrook.edu/faculty/mark.aronoff
a2 Department of Hebrew Language, Department of Disorders, and Sign Language Research Laboratory, University of Haifa, 31905 Haifa, Israel imeir@univ.haifa.ac.il http://sandlersignlab.haifa.ac.il/html/html_eng/irit.htm
a3 Department of Communication, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093-0503 cpadden@ucsd.edu http://communication.ucsd.edu/people/f_padden.html
a4 Department of English Language and Literature, and Sign Language Research Laboratory, University of Haifa, 31905 Haifa, Israel wsandler@research.haifa.ac.il http://sandlersignlab.haifa.ac.il/wendy.htm
Abstract
Sign languages provide direct evidence for the relation between human languages and the body that engenders them. We discuss the use of the hands to create symbols and the role of the body in sign language verb systems, especially in two quite recently developed sign languages, Israeli Sign Language and Al-Sayyid Bedouin Sign Language.
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