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Part of
How the Brain Got Language – Towards a New Road Map
Edited by Michael A. Arbib
[Benjamins Current Topics 112] 2020
► pp. 216–238

From action to spoken and signed language through gesture

Some basic developmental issues for a discussion on the evolution of the human language-ready brain

| Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies (ISTC), National Research Council (CNR) of Italy
| Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies (ISTC), National Research Council (CNR) of Italy
| Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies (ISTC), National Research Council (CNR) of Italy
| Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies (ISTC), National Research Council (CNR) of Italy

We review major developmental evidence on the continuity from action to gesture to word and sign in human children, highlighting the important role of caregivers in the development of multimodal communication. In particular, the basic issues considered here and contributing to the current debate on the origins and development of the language-ready brain are: (1) links between early actions, gestures and words and similarities in representational strategies; (2) importance of multimodal communication and the interplay between gestures and spoken words; (3) interconnections between early actions, gestures and signs. The innovation of this report is in connecting these themes together to relevant findings from studies on children between 6 and 36 months of age and highlighting interesting parallels in studies on ape communicative behavior.

Keywords: child development, communication, multimodality, actions, gestures, words, signs
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • 1.From action to gesture and word
    • 1.1Links between early motor skills and gestures
    • 1.2Early action and gesture ‘‘Vocabulary’’ and its relationship to word comprehension and production
  • 2.Representational techniques across elicited pantomime in children, communicative gestures and sign languages
  • 3.Similarities between gestures and signs
  • 4.Toward a new road map
  • References
  • Appendix
Published online: 11 August 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/bct.112.15vol
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