Workshop #1
Speech-Accompanying Gestures – Current Empirical and Theoretical Advances
organized by Patrick G. Grosz & Sarah Zobel (University of Oslo)
Wednesday July 22, 2021
Workshop Description
In the investigation of speech-accompanying gestures (e.g., McNeill 1992, 2005; Kendon 1972, 2004; Abner et al. 2015), the main research questions include the study of their production and meaning contribution, as well as their interaction with the linguistic signals that they accompany (both signed and spoken). In addition, recent linguistic work discusses how these interactions should be captured in formal linguistic models (see Lascarides & Stone 2009, Ebert & Ebert 2014, Schlenker 2018, Esipova 2019), contributing to the emerging field of super linguistics, which applies formal linguistic methodology to non-standard objects of study (using ‘super’ in its original Latinate meaning ‘beyond’, see Schlenker & Patel-Grosz 2018). Although significant theoretical and empirical advances have been made in the last decades (see Abner et al. 2015, Goldin-Meadow & Brentari 2017), only a fraction of the empirical domain has been explored so far, and many discussions of fundamental theoretical issues have not reached a consensus. For instance, in formal semantics, the very type of meaning that gestures contribute is controversial, and how that meaning should be integrated into the meaning of the speech signal (e.g.,whether it should be modeled as a type of presupposition, or non-restricting modification, etc., compare Schlenker 2018, Esipova 2019, Hunter 2019). This workshop aims to bring together researchers working on different aspects of the connection between linguistic and gestural communication: the empirical study of speechaccompanying gestures (including cross-cultural and cross-linguistic variation, e.g., Kita & Özyürek 2003, Kita 2009, Özçalışkan et al. 2016, Ortega & Özyürek 2019), their formal analysis, as well as extensions of the core phenomenon of speech-accompanying gestures to other communicational media – for instance emojis, which are analyzed as the equivalent of gestures in written computermediated communication (see Gawne & McCulloch 2019, Cohn et al. 2019, Bai et al. 2019).
Speakers
Cornelia Ebert (Goethe University of Frankfurt)
Masha Esipova (Princeton University)
Patrick Georg Grosz (University of Oslo) & Francesco Pierini (École normale supérieure)
Aslı Özyürek (Radboud University / MPI for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen)
Philippe Schlenker (Institut Jean-Nicod, CNRS; New York University)
Call for Posters
We invite contributions for poster presentations. Possible topics for posters include (but are not limited to): theoretical and empirical approaches to speech-accompanying gestures (in the broadest possible sense) and (non-grammaticalized) facial expressions, both in signed and spoken languages; silent gestures; gestures in non-human animals; emojis as gestures; musical gestures (especially sound-accompanying gestures and movements that may or may not be communicative; see Jensenius et al. 2010); communicative body movement (e.g., dance; emotional display of athletes; see Sandler 2018); cross-cultural and cross-linguistic variation in gestures.
Please send a 1-page abstract to
gestures.creteling2021@gmail.com by February 29, 2021. (References are not included in the page count.) Please provide the author(s) name(s), affiliation(s) and contact details in the main body of the email.
Notification of acceptance will be sent out in March 2021.
References
- Abner, N., K. Cooperrider & S. Goldin-Meadow (2015). Gesture for Linguists: A Handy Primer, Language and Linguistics Compass 9, 437-451.
- Bai, Q., Q. Dan, Z. Mu & M.Yang (2019). A Systematic Review of Emoji: Current Research and Future Perspectives. Frontiers in Psychology 10.
- Cohn, N., J. Engelen & J. Schilperoord (2019). The grammar of emoji? Constraints on communicative pictorial sequencing. Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications 4:33.
- Ebert, C., & C. Ebert (2014) Gestures, demonstratives, and the attributive/referential distinction. Slides from a talk given at Semantics and Philosophy in Europe (SPE 7), ZAS, Berlin, June
- 2014. Retrieved from https://semanticsarchive.net/Archive/GJjYzkwN
- Esipova, M. (2019). Composition and projection in speech and gesture. PhD dissertation, New York University.
- Fenlon, J., K. Cooperrider, J. Keane, D. Brentari & S. Goldin-Meadow (2019). Comparing sign language and gesture: Insights from pointing. Glossa – a journal of general linguistics 4, 2.1-26.
- Gawne, L. & G. McCulloch (2019). Emoji as Digital Gestures. Language@Internet. URL: https://www.languageatinternet.org/articles/2019/gawne
- Goldin-Meadow, S. & D. Brentari (2017). Gesture, sign, and language: The coming of age of sign language and gesture studies. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 40, e46.
- Hunter, J. (2019). Relating Gesture to Speech: Reflections On the Role of Conditional Presuppositions. Linguistics & Philosophy 42, 317-332.
- Jensenius, A. R., M. Wanderley, R. I. Godøy & M. Leman (2010). Musical gestures: concepts and methods in research. In R. I. Godøy & M. Leman (eds.): Musical gestures: Sound, movement, and meaning. New York: Routledge, 12-35.
- Kendon, A. (1972). Some relationships between body motion and speech. Studies in dyadic communication 7, 177-216.
- Kendon, A. (2004). Gesture: Visible action as utterance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Kita, S. & A. Özyürek (2003). What does cross-linguistic variation in semantic coordination of speech and gesture reveal?: Evidence for an interface representation of spatial thinking and speaking. Journal of Memory and Language 48, 16-32.
- Kita, S. (2009). Cross-cultural variation of speech-accompanying gesture: A review. Language and cognitive processes 24, 145-167.
- Lascarides, A. & M. Stone (2009). A formal semantic analysis of gesture. Journal of Semantics 26, 393-449.
- McNeill, D. (1992). Hand and mind: What gestures reveal about thought. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
- McNeill, D. (2005). Gesture and thought. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
- Ortega, G. & A. Özyürek (2019). Types of iconicity and combinatorial strategies distinguish semantic categories in silent gesture across cultures. Language and Cognition.
- Özçalışkan, Ş., C. Lucero & S. Goldin-Meadow (2016). Does language shape silent gesture? Cognition 148, 10-18.
- Sandler, W. (2018). The Body as Evidence for the Nature of Language. Frontiers in Psychology 9.
- Schlenker, P. (2018). Gesture projection and cosuppositions. Linguistics & Philosophy 41, 295-365.
- Schlenker, P., & P. Patel-Grosz (2018). What is Super Linguistics? Presentation at workshop “Super Linguistics - an introduction”, University of Oslo, 10th December 2018.
Venue
Student Cultural Center Xenia
16, Sofokli Venizelou str
74100 Rethymnon Crete
