Making grammar visible:
The use of metaphoric gestures to represent grammatical categories and structures
Irene Mittelberg
im33@cornell.edu
I. Introduction
This study investigates gestures produced by four linguists (all native speakers
of American English) while explaining grammatical phenomena in introductory
linguistics courses. Taking a Cognitive Linguistics perspective, I am particularly
interested in metaphoric gestures which are assumed to reflect mental representations
of abstract domains (McNeill, 1992; Webb, 1996). Recent work on metaphorics
suggests that the gesture modality provides additional evidence for conceptual
metaphor (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980, 1999), especially for spatial metaphor,
underlying surface expressions in both the linguistic and gestural modes (Cienki,
1998; Müller, 1998; Sweetser, 1998).
The aim of this study is to offer non-linguistic evidence for some of the metaphorical
models that seem to condition our conceptualization of morphemes, words, phrases,
and sentence structure. I follow McNeill's definition of metaphorics whose pictorial
content represents an abstract idea, "an image of the invisible -- an image
of an abstraction" (McNeill 1992, p. 14). Metaphorics are semantically
powerful, for they simultaneously depict two things: the BASE (vehicle or source
domain) of the metaphor, namely the concrete entity or action represented in
the gesture and 2) the REFERENT (tenor or target domain), that is, the abstract
concept expressed by it (McNeill, 1992, p. 80).
II. Approach and assumptions
1) Concretization of abstract concepts via metaphor
Conceptual metaphor theory (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980, 1999; Lakoff, 1993;
Sweetser, 1990) is based on the idea that abstract concepts are understood in
terms of concrete concepts and that human conceptualization is grounded in physical
and social experience. Embodied experiences with object manipulation and space
play a central role in accessing abstract domains. As for gesture studies, the
following metaphorical mappings seem to be pertinent (Lakoff & Johnson,
1980): UNDERSTANDING IS SEEING and UNDERSTANDING IS GRASPING. By engaging the
body in tracing shapes and movements in the air, gestures can help us see what
is being talked about. This effect is particularly striking when dealing with
invisible subject matters, as Cienki (1998) demonstrates in his work on the
moral concepts ‘honesty’ and ‘dishonesty’ and Sweetser (1998)
in her work on the domain of ‘speech interaction’. Thereby metaphor
and iconicity interact in that the gesture iconically represents the source
domain of the metaphor (Taub, 2001).
2) Abstraction from concrete object manipulation
Investigating the material basis of gestures, Streeck and LeBaron (2000, p.
118) argue that gestures do not simply reflect mental representations, but "originate
in the tactile contact that mindful bodies have with the physical world."
What kinds of physical objects then do linguists appear to abstract from when
producing gestures that, for instance, depict the architecture of a sentence?
It obviously needs to be taken into account that the cultural practice of reading
and writing from left to right (in Western cultures) conditions basic spatial
conceptualizations of the sentence as a horizontal elongated entity. We further
need to consider that linguistic theories are themselves built on specific sets
of metaphors.
3) Assumptions
The abstract domain of grammatical phenomena is conceptualized via a set of
metaphors that surface in both the meta-grammatical discourse and the gesticulation
accompanying it.
These metaphors represent a combination of cognitive models stemming from commonly
shared physical and social experiences on the one hand and the mediation of
theoretical constructs on the other (including diagrams and other visual displays
represented in textbooks, on blackboards, etc.). Both feed into the formation
of symbolic gestural forms that occur, in certain variations, across speakers.
Some of the prominent source domains for metaphors for grammar are: Physical
objects (solid objects and containers), spatial structures, and social hierarchies
(Mittelberg 2002).III. The Study
The corpus consists of videotaped academic lectures held by four linguists (three
females and one male). The approaches to grammar covered in the data discussed
below range from discourse-oriented to generative. The center of attention is
the teachers’ performance and not the interaction between teachers and
students. In what follows, I will give a condensed overview of the most salient
gestural forms and movements that can be observed. The discussion is organized
according to the metaphorical mappings that the gestures seem to reflect.
A. LINGUISTIC CATEGORIES ARE OBJECTS / CONTAINERS and
MORPHEMES I WORDS I PHRASES ARE OBJECTS /CONTAINERS
(IDEAS ARE OBJECTS; CATEGORIES ARE CONTAINERS (Lakoff &
Johnson 1980);
LINGUISTIC EXPRESSIONS ARE CONTAINERS / CONSTITUENTS
ARE CONTENTS,
the conduit metaphor (Reddy, 1979; Grady, 1998))
Phrases, nouns, verbs, morphemes, etc. are predominantly represented as imaginary
physical objects held by two hands more or less apart with palms facing each
other (image 1). Another possibility is to hold the thumb and index finger of
the dominant or both hands up with the remaining fingers relaxed, reminding
of how people take measure. Phrases, or ‘chunks’ of structure, are
represented as larger entities than words and morphemes. Another variant is
to extent one or both open hands with palm upwards, held out towards the audience
to provide a surface on which an object, e.g. a grammatical category, is presented
(image 2). A container with an explicit inside is evoked when speaker refer
to infixes that go into the middle of a morpheme or to constituents into which
the speaker seems to reach to pull out a sub-constituent. Choices between a
solid object and a container or between the parts or actions that are highlighted
are thus motivated by considerations of function and economy.
B. A SENTENCE IS AN OBJECT / CONTAINER or
A
LINEAR SEQUENCE OF OBJECTS
Gestures referring to such conceptualizations are either similar to the ones
mentioned above for smaller linguistic units, that is, two relatively relaxed
hands apart with palms facing each other, thus seemingly supporting an elongated
object extending between them, or a bounded container in which constituents
may be placed. Another gesture starts out with two hands joined at the fingertips
and then both moving outwards from the speaker as if they were tracing a line,
e.g. a string or chain of words. The boundaries between the units may be depicted
via a vertically held hand with the fingertips pointing towards the audience,
repeatedly going up and down, as if the speaker was cutting the imaginary string
into chunks.
One speaker demonstrates the word order change implied in transforming an active
sentence into a passive by referring to the subject object inversion as a ‘flip-flop’.
She produces a gesture starting out with both forearms held vertically and aligned
with the shoulders, index fingers extended. Then she crosses her arms over to
illustrate the idea of switching elements around (image 3).
C. SYNTACTIC STRUCTURES ARE HIERARCHICAL SPATIAL STRUCTURES
(CONCEPTUAL STRUCTURE IS PHYSICAL GEOMETRIC STRUCTURE, Sweetser, 1998)
The crucial difference between syntactic tree diagrams (generative syntactic
theory) and linear conceptualizations of a sentence is that the former exploits
an additional spatial dimension through a schematic downward branching structure
alluding to family trees. It represents a blend of a spatial and social hierarchy.
Categories are brought into conceptual (metonymic) relation to one another,
with the most powerful, governing elements at the top and the dominated, subordinated
elements at lower levels (the front-back distinction is replaced by top-bottom).
We thus need to integrate the following mapping to successfully read gestures
tracing tree structures:
D. HAVING CONTROL IS UP / BEING SUBJECT TO CONTROL IS DOWN HIGH STATUS / POWER
IS UP (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980; Sweetser, 1998)
One speaker repeatedly illustrates the idea of branching by forming a triangle
with her forearms held diagonally and the hands joined at the top (image 4).
The node is also represented by the emblematic OK-gesture. Movements tracing
a branch that extends toward the lower right depict dependent clauses, giving
a literal rendition of sub-ordination. The tree structure provides slots in
gesture space where embedded clauses can be plugged in. A corresponding gesture
consists of the right arm extended towards the floor with the palm facing the
audience, seemingly holding an object that is then plugged in via a movement
towards the lower right. Embeddedness is not represented in terms of encapsulation,
rather as a diagonal line continuing towards the ground (image 5). That the
internal structure is conceived as hierarchical is sometimes solely suggested
in the gesture modality.
IV. Preliminary conclusions
It appears that a set of metaphoric models underlies surface expressions in
both modalities, the linguistic and the gestural. Mental models of grammatical
categories and structures seem to be motivated by embodied physical experience,
geometric spatial structure, and theoretical constructs. Thereby representation
may imply a sort of 'detour': concretization (via metaphor) and abstraction
(via iconicity). Metaphorics pick up some of the salient parts that hands come
into contact with when handling physical objects.
Conceptual coherence is afforded through the interaction of metaphor and metonymy:
for instance, containers standing in for constituents are placed in a spatial
structure allowing to infer their interrelation and respective function. This
is either done by adopting a linear sentence model or the syntactic tree structure
which is a blend of a spatial and social hierarchy. The embodied practice of
drawing tree structures may also influence such gestural diagrams. Furthermore,
teachers tend to gesture more vividly when responding to questions, that is,
when they leave their script and convey knowledge spontaneously. Due to their
very nature, gestures render a comparatively dynamic image of grammar.
Gesture can thus provide additional insights in how humans conceptualize abstract
concepts via metaphor. There are many avenues for future research. One would
be to compare the tendencies documented here with other abstract subject matters
in order to arrive at a more complete picture of how language and cognition
handle abstract challenges.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank James Gair, Monica Gonzalez-Marquez, Gunhild Lischke,
Maria Serrano, Michael Spivey, Eve Sweetser, Linda Waugh, and Rebecca Webb for
valuable comments and suggestions. I also thank Richard Feldman and Andrew Page
from the Cornell Language Resource Center for technical support.
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