[Lingtyp] Testing a generalization about spatial reference frames

Fri Mar 5 19:18:50 UTC 2021

Yahgan, a critically endangered language from Tierra del Fuego, had an
extensive system of orientational/directional terms derived from cardinal
direction terms, with two main systems- a prefixal one on verbs, and a
suffixal one on nominals. A right/left dichotomy was rarely used except
with relation to bodies in general. Interestingly, the orientation of the
shore to the a:nan (canoe) was related to the right/left system. iski, the
(lower) back of some object or body, is related to the left hand
functionally (due to the eliminative uses of the left hand presumably), and
also refers to the larboard (left) side of the canoe, thus iskipai
'back/left-to/towards, Similarly right is associated with (upper) front-
ushaiipai 'right-towards', note sha 'front' (of something standing), ushsha
'upper/inner part' (as of a river or in the hut), again presumably because
of the use of the right hand in feeding food to the face (in the average
right-handed person).

Jess Tauber

On Fri, Mar 5, 2021 at 1:40 PM Stela Manova <stela.manova at univie.ac.at>
wrote:

> In Vienna, in relation to the Vienna river: Rechte Wienzeile is on the
> right bank of the river, Linke Wienzeile is on the left bank, details at:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wienzeile.
> Best,
> Stela
>
> On 05.03.2021, at 14:55, Peter Arkadiev <peterarkadiev at yandex.ru> wrote:
>
> There is Rouen-Rive-Droite :-)
>
> Peter
>
> 05.03.2021, 13:42, "Maia Ponsonnet" <maia.ponsonnet at uwa.edu.au>:
>
> of course there is Paris-Rive-Gauche.
> but on the other hand I'd say it's partly lexicalized.
> people much more rarely talk about "rive droite", and I don't think the
> terminology applies in, says, Lyon with the Rhône for instance?
> Maïa
>
>
>
>
>
> Dr Maïa Ponsonnet
> Senior Lecturer, Discipline of Linguistics
> Graduate Research Coordinator, School of Social Sciences
> Building M257, Room 2.36
> Faculty of Arts, Business, Law and Education
> The University of Western Australia
> 35 Stirling Hwy, Perth, WA (6009), Australia
> P.  +61 (0) 8 6488 2870 - M.  +61 (0) 468 571 030
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> on behalf of
> Tilman Berger <tberger at uni-tuebingen.de>
> *Sent:* Friday, 5 March 2021 6:20 PM
> *To:* lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org
> >
> *Subject:* Re: [Lingtyp] Testing a generalization about spatial reference
> frames
>
> Dear all,
> I would like to support this point, that "left" and "right" can be
> lexicalized toponyms. There is the distinction of "Left-bank Ukraine" (Лівобережна
> Україна) and "Right-bank Ukraine" (Правобережна Україна), where "left"
> means the western bank and "right" the eastern. These terms have been in
> use since the 17th century.
> Best wishes
> Tilman
>
>
> Am 05.03.21 um 11:05 schrieb David Gil:
>
> Dear all,
> Relative terms making reference to "left" or "right" may also be
> lexicalized to form toponyms.  For example, the country name Yemen is
> actually a lexicalization of the Arabic word for "right", drawing upon an
> canonical orientation facing the rising sun to the east.
> David
>
>
> On 05/03/2021 10:36, Dmitry Nikolaev wrote:
>
> Dear Juergen,
>
> I don't know what level of conventionalisation you are looking for, but
> speakers of Russian, at least those who grew up in large cities, tend in
> general to avoid using geocentric terms and feel uncomfortable using them,
> and if it is at all possible to say "The lake is to the right of the hill",
> I would personally do so. A quick googling showed that this phraseology is
> quite frequent in route descriptions, and this YouTube video literally
> advertises a plot of land "to the left of lake Veselovka".
>
> My best,
> Dmitry
>
> On Fri, 5 Mar 2021 at 07:26, Bohnemeyer, Juergen <jb77 at buffalo.edu> wrote:
>
> Dear all — I’d like to solicit your help with a generalization. I’m
> wondering whether anybody is aware of a counterexample:
>
> It is well known that there are communities whose members regularly use
> geocentric terms in reference to the speaker’s own body, as in
>
> (1) ‘My western/downhill arm hurts’.
>
> E.g., Laughren (1978) mentions this phenomenon in reference to Warlpiri.
> Levinson (2003: 4) notes that the practice exists among speakers of Guugu
> Yimithirr (Pama-Nyungan, Queensland). Haun & Rapold (2011) present an
> experimental study of the practice with speakers of ≠Akhoe Hai||om
> (Khoekhoe, Namibia).
>
> Now, I’m interested in what you might consider something of an inverse of
> this kind of use: the use of relative frames at the geographic scale, as in
>
> (2) ‘The lake is to the right of the hill’
>
> My generalization is that there doesn’t seem to be any community in which
> the type of use exemplified by (2) is conventional.
>
> That is to say, of course we can easily imagine situations in which
> English speakers might exchange something like (2):
>
> * A speaker looking at the lake and hill might use (2) to describe what
> she sees to an interlocutor who doesn’t have visual access to the scene.
> The speaker might use relative language in this case in order to produce a
> vivid image of the scene as it presents itself to her.
>
> * A speaker looking at representations of the hill and lake on a map might
> use (2) metonymically.
>
> However, I’m unaware of a community in which something like (2) would be a
> conventional way of locating landscape entities with respect to one another
> in the absence of visual access to (representations of) them.
>
> (One could argue that (2) is pragmatically semi-infelicitous in such a
> context since the truth of (2) depends on the location of the observer,
> which is usually more variable than that of the hill and lake. However,
> even though the truth of (1) similarly changes with the speaker’s
> orientation, it is presumed to be an entrenched strategy for this context
> in several cultures. My interest is partly in this asymmetry.)
>
> I’m curious whether people are aware of counterexamples.
>
> Thanks! — Juergen
>
> Haun, D. M. B. & C. J. Rapold. (2011). Variation in memory for body
> movements across cultures. Current Biology 19(23): R1068-1069.
>
> Laughren,M. (1978). Directional terminology in Warlpiri. in Th. Le and M.
> McCausland (eds.), Working papers in language and linguistics, 8: 1–16.
> Launceston: Tasmanian College of Advanced Education.
>
> Levinson, S. C. (2003). Space in language and cognition. Cambridge: CUP.
>
> --
> Juergen Bohnemeyer (He/Him)
> Professor, Department of Linguistics
> University at Buffalo
>
> Office: 642 Baldy Hall, UB North Campus
> Mailing address: 609 Baldy Hall, Buffalo, NY 14260
> Phone: (716) 645 0127
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>
> Office hours will be held by Zoom. Email me to schedule a call at any
> time. I will in addition hold Tu/Th 4-5pm open specifically for remote
> office hours.
>
> There’s A Crack In Everything - That’s How The Light Gets In
> (Leonard Cohen)
>
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> --
> David Gil
>
> Senior Scientist (Associate)
> Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution
> Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History
> Kahlaische Strasse 10, 07745 Jena, Germany
>
> Email: gil at shh.mpg.de
> Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-526117713
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>
>
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> --
> Tilman Berger
> Slavisches Seminar
> Universitaet Tuebingen
> Wilhelmstr. 50
> D-72074 Tuebingen
>
> E-Mail: tberger at uni-tuebingen.de
> Homepage: https://uni-tuebingen.de/de/135724
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> Peter Arkadiev, PhD Habil.
> Institute of Slavic Studies
> Russian Academy of Sciences
> Leninsky prospekt 32-A 119334 Moscow
> peterarkadiev at yandex.ru
> http://inslav.ru/people/arkadev-petr-mihaylovich-peter-arkadiev
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