Part of
Anthropological Linguistics: Perspectives from AfricaEdited by Andrea Hollington, Alice Mitchell and Nico Nassenstein
[Culture and Language Use 23] 2024
► pp. 83–103
Edited by Andrea Hollington, Alice Mitchell and Nico Nassenstein
[Culture and Language Use 23] 2024
► pp. 83–103
Chapter 4Mouths, tongues, and ears
Source concepts for ‘language’ across Africa
This paper investigates words for ‘language’ and their possible source concepts in 130 African languages. Radden (2001) noted that words for ‘language’ almost always draw on more basic meanings and proposed a metonymic chain from (i) speech organs to (ii) speaking as activity to (iii) speech as “object” to (iv) language. Our sample provides additional evidence for these semantic pathways, showing that ‘tongue’ and ‘mouth’ are important source concepts for ‘language’ across Africa, as well as concepts relating to speech. After summarizing the survey results, we consider the novel extension ‘ear’ to ‘language’ in Datooga. While frequently attested metonymic processes point to widespread conceptualizations of language as embodied, we nonetheless find cultural variation in which aspects of speech behavior provide conceptual material for words for ‘language’.
Keywords: language, metonymy, semantic typology
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Data collection and coding strategies
- 3.Cross-linguistic findings
- 4.‘Language’ in Datooga
- 5.Conclusion
-
Notes -
References -
Appendix
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.
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