Cover not available
Part of
Body Part Terms in Conceptualization and Language Usage
Edited by Iwona Kraska-Szlenk
[Cognitive Linguistic Studies in Cultural Contexts 12] 2020
► pp. 77–98

Towards a semantic lexicon of body part terms

This chapter focuses on recurring patterns of semantic extension of body part terms taking into account two major factors which lie at the heart of the phenomenon, one being the so-called embodied cognition, the other – shared culture. While these two factors lead to considerable resemblance among unrelated languages, they encounter the counterbalance of language-specific features resulting from non-shared culture and different language usage practices. The question posed is whether a systematic research program can examine polysemy of body part terms from a cross-linguistic perspective and what kinds of difficulties this kind of research would have to overcome.

Keywords: body part terms, embodiment, cognitive universals, polysemy, semantic change, semantic extension
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Embodied cognition and linguistic embodiment
  • 3.Cross-linguistic tendencies in extension of body part terms
  • 4.Body part terms and cross-linguistic equivalence
  • 5.Equivalence of extended senses
  • Concluding remarks and further research questions
  • Notes
  • Acknowledgement
  • References
Published online: 23 March 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/clscc.12.c04kra
References
Aikhenvald, Alexandra Y.
(2000) Classifiers: A Typology of Noun Categorization Devices. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Andersen, Elaine
(1978) “Lexical universals of body-part terminology”. In: Joseph H. Greenberg (ed.), Universals of Human Language, vol. 3: Word Structure . Stanford: Stanford University Press. 335–368.Google Scholar
Bańkowski, Andrzej
(2000) Etymologiczny słownik języka polskiego [Etymological dictionary of Polish]. Vol. 1. Warszawa: Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe.Google Scholar
Barsalou, Lawrence W.
(1999) “Perceptual symbol systems”. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 22: 577–660. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2008) “Grounding symbolic operations in the brain’s modal systems”. In: Gün R. Semin and Eliot R. Smith (eds.), Embodied Grounding: Social, Cognitive, Affective, and Neuroscientific Approaches. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 8–42. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2010) “Grounded Cognition: Past, Present, and Future”. Topics in Cognitive Science 2: 716–724. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Basso, Keith H.
(1967) “Semantic aspects of linguistic acculturation”. American Anthropologist 69: 471–477. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bergen, Benjamin, Ting-Ting Chan Lau, Shweta Narayan, Diana Stojanovic and Kathryn Wheeler
(2010) “Body parts representations in verbal semantics”. Memory and Cognition 38/7: 969–981. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Brenzinger, Matthias and Iwona Kraska-Szlenk
(eds.) (2014) The Body in Language: Comparative Studies of Linguistic Embodiment (Series Editors: Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald, Robert M. W. Dixon and Nick J. Enfield, Brill’s Studies in Language, Cognition and Culture, vol. 8). Leiden: Brill. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Brown, Cecil H.
(1976) “General principles of human anatomical partonomy and speculations on the growth of partonomic nomenclature. American Anthropologist 3: 400–24.Google Scholar
(2013a) “Finger and hand”. In: Dryer and Haspelmath (eds.), The World Atlas of Language Structures Online. Munich: Max Planck Digital Library. Available online at [URL]. Chapter 130.Google Scholar
(2013b) “Hand and arm”. In: Dryer and Haspelmath (eds.), The World Atlas of Language Structures Online. Munich: Max Planck Digital Library. Available online at [URL]. Chapter 129.Google Scholar
Brown, Cecil H. and Stanley R. Witkowski
(1981) “Figurative language in a universalist perspective”. American Ethnologist 8/3: 596–615. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1983) Polysemy, lexical change, and cultural importance. Man 18 (1): 72–89. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bybee, Joan
(2007) Frequency of Use and the Organization of Language, Oxford: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Csordas, T. J.
(ed.) (1994) Embodiment and Experience: The Existential Ground of Culture and Self. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Dąbrowska, Ewa
(2008) The effects of frequency and neighbourhood density on adult native speakers’ productivity with Polish case inflections: An empirical test of usage-based approaches to morphology. Journal of Memory and Language 58. 931–951. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Derksen, Rick
(2008)  Etymological Lexicon of the Slavic Inherited Lexicon (Series Editor: Alexander Lubotsky, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series, vol. 4). Leiden/Boston: Brill.Google Scholar
Evans, Nicholas and David Wilkins
(2000) “In the minds ear: The semantic extensions of perception verbs in Australian languages”. Language 76/3: 546–587. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gaby, Alice
(2006) “The Thaayorre ‘true man’: Lexicon of the human body in an Australian language”. In: Majid et al. (eds.). 201–220. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gąsiorowski, Piotr
(2017) “The embarrassment of riches: ‘Head’ words in the Indo-European family”. Yearbook of the Poznań Linguistic Meeting 3. De Gruyter Open. 101–115. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gibbs, Raymond W. Jr.
(2006) Embodiment and Cognitive Science. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Geeraerts, Dirk and Stefan Grondelaers
(1995) “Looking back at anger: Cultural traditions and metaphorical patterns. In: John R. Taylor and Robert E. MacLaury (eds.), Language and the Cognitive Construal of the World. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 153‐179. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Heine, Bernd
(1997) Cognitive Foundations of Grammar. New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
(2014) “The body in language: Observations from grammaticalization”. In: M. Brenzinger and I. Kraska-Szlenk (eds.). 13–32.Google Scholar
(2019) “Grammaticalization in Africa: Two contrasting hypotheses”. In: Heiko Narrog and Bernd Heine (eds.). 16–34. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Heine, Bernd, Ulrike Claudi and Friederike Hünnemeyer
(1991) Grammaticalization: A conceptual framework. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Heine, Bernd and Tania Kuteva
(2002) World Lexicon of Grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hilpert, Martin
(2007) “Chained metonymies in lexicon and grammar: A cross-linguistic perspective on body-part terms”. In: Günter Radden, Klaus-Michael Köpcke, Thomas Berg and Peter Siemund (eds.), Aspects of Meaning Construction. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 77–98.Google Scholar
Janda, Laura A.
(2011) “Metonymy in word-formation”. Cognitive Linguistics 22/2: 359–392. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Johansson Falck, Marlene and Raymond W. Gibbs Jr.
(2012) “Embodied motivations for metaphorical meanings”. Cognitive Linguistics 23/2: 251–272. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Johnson, Mark
(1987) The Body in the Mind: The Bodily Basis of Meaning, Imagination and Reason. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lakoff, George
(1987) Women, Fire and Dangerous Things: What Categories Reveal about the Mind. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lakoff, George and Mark Johnson
(1980) Metaphors We Live By. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
(1999) Philosophy in the Flesh: The embodied Mind and its Challenge to Western Thought. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Koptjevskaja-Tamm, Maria
(2008) Approaching lexical typology. In M. Vanhove (ed.), From Polysemy to Semantic Change: Towards a Typology of Lexical Semantic Associations, pp. 3–52. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kövecses, Zoltán
(2000) Metaphor and Emotion: Language, Culture and the Body in Human Feeling. Cambridge: Cambrigde University Press.Google Scholar
(2005) Metaphor in Culture: Universality and Variation. Cambridge: Cambrigde University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kraska-Szlenk, Iwona
(2005) “Metaphor and metonymy in the semantics of body parts: A contrastive analysis”. In: Elżbieta Górska and Günter Radden (ed.), Metonymy-Metaphor Collage. Warszawa: Warsaw University Press. 157–175.Google Scholar
(2007) Analogy: The Relation between Lexicon and Grammar. LINCOM Studies in Theoretical Linguistics 38. München: LINCOM Europa.Google Scholar
(2014a) “Semantic extensions of body part terms: Common patterns and their interpretation”. Language Sciences 44: 15–39. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2014b) Semantics of Body Part Terms: General Trends and a Case Studyof Swahili. LINCOM Studies in Semantics 6. Munchen: LINCOM Europa.Google Scholar
(ed.) (2019a) Embodiment in Cross-Linguistic Studies: The ‘Head’. Leiden: Brill. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2019b) “Metonymic extensions of the body part ‘head’ in mental and social domains”. In: Iwona Kraska-Szlenk (ed.). 136–154. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Langacker, Ronald W.
(2009) “A dynamic view of usage and language acquisition”. Cognitive Linguistics. 627–640.Google Scholar
Majid, Asifa
(2006) “Body part categorisation in Punjabi”. In: Asifa Majid, Nick J. Enfield, and Miriam van Staden (eds.), 241–261. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Majid, Asifa, Nick J. Enfield, and Miriam van Staden
(eds.) (2006) Parts of the body: Cross-linguistic categorization. Language Sciences 28(2–3).Google Scholar
Maalej, Zouheir and Ning Yu
(eds.) (2011) Embodiment via Body Parts: Studies from Various Languages and Cultures. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Narrog, Heiko and Bernd Heine
(eds.) (2011) The Oxford Handbook of Grammaticalization. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
(eds.) (2019) Grammaticalization from a Typological Perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pattillo, Kelsie
(2019) “From head to toe: How languages extend the head to name body parts”. In: Iwona Kraska-Szlenk (ed.). 124–135.. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Rice, Sally
(2014) “Corporeal incorporation and extension in Dene Sųłine (Athapaskan) lexicalization”. In Brenzinger and Kraska-Szlenk (eds.). 71–97. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Schladt, Mathias
(2000) “The typology and grammaticalization of reflexives”. In: Zygmunt Frajzyngier and Traci S. Curl (eds.), Reflexives: Forms and Functions. Typological Studies in Language 40. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 103–124. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sharifian, Farzad
(2011) Cultural Conceptualizations and Language. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Sharifian, Farzad, René Dirven, Ning Yu and Susanne Niemeier
(eds.) (2008) Culture, Body, and Language: Conceptualizations of Internal Body Organs across Cultures and Languages. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Siahaan, Poppy
(2011) “ head and eye in German and Indonesian figurative uses”. In Maalej and Yu (eds.). 93–113. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Siakaluk, Paul D., Penny M. Pexman, Holly-Anne R. Dalrymple, Jodie Stearns and William J. Owen
(2011) “Some insults are more difficult to ignore: The embodied insult Stroop effect”. Language and Cognitive Processes 26/8: 1266–1294. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Svorou, Soteria
(1994) The grammar of space. Typological Studies in Language 25. Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Benjamins.Google Scholar
Sweetser, Eve E.
(1990) From Etymology to Pragmatics: Metaphorical and cultural Aspects of Semantic Structure. Cambridge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ukosakul, Margaret
(2003) “Conceptual metaphors motivating the use of Thai ‘face’. In: Eugene H. Casad and Gary B. Palmer (eds.), Cognitive Linguistics and non-Indo-European Languages. Cognitive Linguistics Research 18. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. 275–303. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Wierzbicka, Anna
(2007) “Bodies and their parts: An NSM approach to semantic typology”. Language Sciences. 14–65. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Yu, Ning
(2001) “What does our face mean to us?” Pragmatics and Cognition 9/1: 1–36. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2009) From Body to Meaning in Culture: Papers on Cognitive Semantic Studies of Chinese. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
This volume). “Linguistic embodiment in linguistic experience: A corpus-based study”.
Zariquiey, Roberto
(2019) “Diachronic stories of body-part nouns in some language families of South America”. In: Heiko Narrog and Bernd Heine (eds.). 350–371. DOI logoGoogle Scholar