[Lingtyp] Query: 'come here' > 'hey' > 'you' path of grammaticalization

Fri Dec 13 07:30:20 UTC 2024

David

Thanks for your response – your HEY/COME-HERE sounds very similar to our HEY (but different from Auslan and BSL COME-HERE) but I’d have to see the data to be sure. As you point out, the palm up beckoning emblematic gesture in the English-speaking world tends to differ in palm orientation in other parts of the world where it’s palm down (and may confuse English speakers because it superficially resembles a ‘go away’ gesture for us). 

The extension to a second person pronoun is super interesting so I wonder whether the Papuan sign variety you’re looking at occurs in a lip and head/non-manual pointing culture– one in which index finger pointing is not the preferred indexical gesture, as has been reported for the Yupno people in PNG (see Cooperrider, Slotta, and Nuńez, 2018 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/cogs.12585). 

Best wishes,

Adam

From: David Gil <dapiiiiit at gmail.com>
Date: Friday, 13 December 2024 at 04:14
To: Adam Schembri <adamcgschembri at gmail.com>
Cc: "LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG" <LINGTYP at listserv.linguistlist.org>
Subject: Re: [Lingtyp] Query: 'come here' > 'hey' > 'you' path of grammaticalization

Thanks Adam,

In response to your question, the the sign in question involves the hand extended upwards and/or forward, palm facing downwards, with repeated motions of the fingers towards the signer.  With the 'come here', or beckoning function, this gesture is widespread among oral communities throughout the world, including Indonesia, Japan, at least parts of the Mediterranean, and elsewhere.  The interesting question is whether the extended, or grammaticalized usages of the sign, meaning 'hey' and/or 'you' found in the Papuan Home Sign system, are also attested as gestures in oral communities, either in the neighborhood of the Papuan Home Sign system, or elsewhere.  I suspect that they are not, or at least not as frequent, and that the 'come here' > 'hey' > 'you' path of grammaticalization is specific to the Papuan Home Sign system.  But I am not sure about this, and am only beginning to systematically explore the use of gestures amongst the neighboring oral communities.

David

On Thu, Dec 12, 2024 at 10:53 PM Adam Schembri <adamcgschembri at gmail.com> wrote:

Dear David,

That’s very interesting! 

In the sign languages I know best (British Sign Language and Auslan – from the same sign language family), the attention-getting sign we gloss as HEY (a handshape with all fingers and thumb extended and held apart, palm oriented downwards, bending downwards at the wrist, held within eye-shot of another signer), the sign BECKON/COME-HERE (either the extended index, or all of the fingers, held palm upwards, bending repeatedly at the knuckles), and the second person pronoun (index finger pointing at the addressee) are all distinct signs that appear to have lexicalised/grammaticalised from related gestures used by hearing non-signers. 

Is there any similarity between a beckoning/attention getting gesture used by Papuan non-signers and the sign variety you are studying?
Best wishes,

Adam

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From: Lingtyp <lingtyp-bounces at listserv.linguistlist.org> on behalf of David Gil via Lingtyp <lingtyp at listserv.linguistlist.org>
Reply to: David Gil <dapiiiiit at gmail.com>
Date: Thursday, 12 December 2024 at 10:54
To: "LINGTYP at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG" <LINGTYP at listserv.linguistlist.org>
Subject: [Lingtyp] Query: 'come here' > 'hey' > 'you' path of grammaticalization

Dear all,

A few months ago I posted a query asking about a possible path of grammaticalization from 'come here' to an attention-attracting particle 'hey'.  The query was motivated by the apparent existence of such a grammaticalization path in a Home Sign system that I am currently exploring in Papua.

Subsequent work suggests that in the Papuan Home System in question, the same form may be undergoing further grammaticalization, assuming the role of a 2nd person pronoun or index.  The entire path of grammaticalization may thus be represented as

'come here' > 'hey' > 'you'

My question: Is anybody familiar with other examples, from either signed or oral languages, of a similar path of grammaticalization, in which a 2nd person pronoun or index is derived from an attention-attracting particle and/or an expression meaning 'come here'.  (For what it's worth, no such cases are listed in Heine and Kuteva's "World Lexicon of Grammaticalization".)

Thanks,

David

-- 

David Gil

Senior Scientist (Associate)
Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
Deutscher Platz 6, Leipzig, 04103, Germany

Email: dapiiiiit at gmail.com
Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-526117713
Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-082113720302

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-- 

David Gil

Senior Scientist (Associate)
Department of Linguistic and Cultural Evolution
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
Deutscher Platz 6, Leipzig, 04103, Germany

Email: dapiiiiit at gmail.com
Mobile Phone (Israel): +972-526117713
Mobile Phone (Indonesia): +62-082113720302

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