Cover not available
Part of
Emotion in Discourse
Edited by J. Lachlan Mackenzie and Laura Alba-Juez
[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 302] 2019
► pp. 139–158

Chapter 6
The value of left and right

| Radboud University, Nijmegen (Netherlands)
This chapter focuses on the emotive value (‘axiology’) of words for left and right in different languages. As a general picture, an asymmetry emerges, with a positive value for right and a negative one for left. The chapter further explores whether this asymmetry is reflected in other domains like in cognitive behavior, culture, and the brain. Special attention is paid to the question whether the left-right dimension should be considered as an image schema in cognitive-linguistic theorizing and whether the axiological dimension should be considered as an integral part of this and other image schemas. In general, the chapter argues that research on the axiological value of words for left and right contributes to insights in the role of laterality in general, including the lateralization of language, handedness and emotion.
Keywords: axiology, emotion, handedness, image schema, laterality, left, right
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Left and right in cognition
    • 2.1Left-right and unconscious behavioral preferences
    • 2.2Is left-right an image schema?
    • 2.3Image schemas and axiology
  • 3.Left and right in languages
    • 3.1Words for left and right
    • 3.2Taboo and euphemisms for left
    • 3.3Figurative extensions
  • 4.Left and right in art and culture
    • 4.1Politics
    • 4.2Traffic
    • 4.3Discrimination of left-handers and reversal of values
  • 5.Explanations for evaluative differences between left and right
    • 5.1Handedness
    • 5.2Emotional processing in the brain
    • 5.3An upgrade for the right hemisphere
  • 6.Conclusions and outlook
  • Acknowledgements
  • References
Published online: 27 March 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.302.06foo
References (43)
References
Alba-Juez, Laura & J. Lachlan Mackenzie. 2016. Pragmatics: Cognition, Context and Culture. Madrid: McGraw Hill.Google Scholar
Bertuccelli Papi, Marcella. 2013. “A Preliminary Study of Idiomatic and Figurative Uses of ‘hand’ in English and ‘mano’ in Italian: Embodiment and Cultural Filters.” Rassegna Italiana di Linguistica Applicata 1: 17‒38.Google Scholar
Boesch, Christophe, Ammie K. Kalan, Anthony Agbor, Mimi Arandjelovic, Paula Dieguez, Vincent Lapeyre & Hjalmar S. Küh. 2016. “Chimpanzees Routinely Fish for Algae with Tools during the Dry Season in Bakoun, Guinea.” American Journal of Primatology 79 (3): e22613. DOI logo.Google Scholar
Casasanto, Daniel. 2009. “Embodiment of Abstract Concepts: Good and Bad in Right- and Left-Handers.” Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 138: 351‒356. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2017. “A History of Handedness Shows How Attitudes Can Influence Scientific Conclusions.” Science 1246. [URL], accessed January 19, 2018.
Casasanto, Daniel & Kyle Jasmin. 2010. “Good and Bad in the Hands of Politicians: Spontaneous Gestures during Positive and Negative Speech.” PLoS ONE 5 (7), July 28. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cienki, Alan. 1998. “STRAIGHT: An Image Schema and its Metaphorical Extensions.” Cognitive Linguistics 9 (2): 107‒149. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 1999. “The Strengths and Weaknesses of the Left/Right Polarity in Russian: Diachronic and Synchronic Semantic Analyses.” In Issues in Cognitive Linguistics: 1993 Proceedings of the International Cognitive Linguistics Conference, ed. by Leon de Stadler & Christoph Eyrich, 299‒329. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Clausner, Timothy & William Croft. 1999. “Domains and Image Schemas.” Cognitive Linguistics 10 (1): 1‒31. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Corballis, Michael C. 1991. The Lopsided Ape: Evolution of the Generative Mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
De la Fuente, Juanma, Daniel Casasanto, Antonio Román & Julio Santiago. 2011. “Searching for Cultural Influences on the Body-Specific Association of Preferred Hand and Emotional Valence.” CogSci 2011 Proceedings, 2616‒2620.Google Scholar
. 2015. “Can Culture Influence Body-Specific Associations between Space and Valence?” Cognitive Science 39 (4): 821‒832. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fillmore, Charles J. 1975. “An Alternative to Checklist Theories of Meaning.” Proceedings of the 1st Annual Meeting. Berkeley: Berkeley Linguistics Society, 123‒131.Google Scholar
Fitch, W. Tecumseh & Stephani N. Braccini. 2013. “Primate Laterality and the Biology and Evolution of Human Handedness: A Review and Synthesis.” Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1288: 70‒85. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Foolen, Ad. 2015. “Word Valence and its Effects.” In Emotion in Language, ed. by Ulrike M. Lüdtke, 241‒255. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2016. “Expressives.” In The Routledge Handbook of Semantics, ed. by Nick Riemer, 473‒490. London/New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
. 2017. “The Hand in Figurative Thought and Language.” In Studies in Figurative Thought and Language, ed. by Angeliki Athanasiadou, 179‒198. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fryklund, Daniel. 1907. Les changements de significations des expressions de droite et de gauche dans les langues romanes et spécialement en français. Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksel.Google Scholar
Godfrey, Hazel K. & Gina M. Grimshaw. 2016. “Emotional Language is All Right: Emotional Prosody Reduces Hemispheric Asymmetry for Linguistic Processing.” Laterality 21 (4‒6): 568‒584. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Granet, Marcel. 1973 [1933, in French]. “Right and Left in China.” In Right and Left: Essays on Dual Symbolic Classification, ed. by Rodney Needham, 43‒58. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Hall, James. 2008. The Sinister Side: How Left-Right Symbolism Shaped Western Art. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hampe, Beate. 2005. “When Down is Not Bad, and Up is Not Good Enough: A Usage-Based Assessment of the Plus-Minus Parameter in Image-Schema Theory.” Cognitive Linguistics 16 (1): 81‒112. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hertz, Robert. 1973 [1909, in French]. “The Pre-Eminence of the Right Hand: A Study in Religious Polarity.” In Right and Left: Essays on Dual Symbolic Classification, ed. by Rodney Needham, 3‒31. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Johnson, Mark. 1987. The Body in the Mind: The Bodily Basis of Meaning, Imagination, and Reason. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
. 2005. “The Philosophical Significance of Image Schemas.” In From Perception to Meaning: Image Schemas in Cognitive Linguistics, ed. by Beate Hampe, 15‒33. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2007. The Meaning of the Body. Aesthetics of Human Understanding. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Jost, John T. 2009. “‘Elective Affinities’: On the Psychological Bases of Left-Right Differences.” Psychological Inquiry 29 (2–3): 129‒141. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Krzeszowski, Tomasz P. 1993. “The Axiological Parameter in Preconceptual Image Schemata.” In Conceptualizations and Mental Processing in Language, ed. by Richard Geiger & Brygida Rudzka-Ostyn, 307‒329. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
1997. Angels and Devils in Hell: Elements of Axiology in Semantics. Warsaw: Wydawn.Google Scholar
Kushner, Howard I. 2017. On the Other Hand: Left Hand, Right Brain, Mental Disorder, and History. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Laponce, Jean. 1981. Left and Right: The Topography of Political Perceptions. Toronto/Buffalo: University of Toronto Press.Google Scholar
Lakoff, George. 1987. Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Leeuwen-Turnovcová, Jiřina van. 1989. “Semantik und Symbolik von ‘links’ und ‘rechts’.” In Sprechen und Hören: Akten des 23. Linguistischen Kolloquiums, Berlin 1988, ed. by Norbert Reiter, 573‒585. Tübingen: Niemeyer.Google Scholar
Lichtenstein-Vidne, Limor, Shai Gabay, Noga Cohen & Avishai Henik. 2017. “Lateralisation of Emotions: Evidence from Pupil Size Measurement.” Cognition and Emotion 31 (4): 699‒711. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lindell, Annukka K. 2006. “In your Right Mind: Right Hemisphere Contributions to Language Processing and Production.” Neuropsychology Review 16: 131‒148. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
McManus, Chris. 2002. Right Hand, Left Hand: The Origins of Asymmetry in Brains, Bodies, Atoms and Cultures. London: Phoenix.Google Scholar
Needham, Rodney (ed.) 1973. Right and Left: Essays on Dual Symbolic Classification. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Núñez, Rafael E. & Carlos Cornejo. 2012. “Facing the Sunrise: Cultural Worldview Underlying Intrinsic-Based Encoding of Absolute Frames of Reference in Aymara.” Cognitive Science 36 (6): 965‒991. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Palka, Joel W. 2002. “Left/Right Symbolism and the Body in Ancient Maya Iconography and Culture.” Late American Antiquity 13 (4): 419‒443. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Schiefenhövel, Wulf. 2013. “Biased Semantics for Right and Left in 50 Indo-European and Non-Indo-European Languages.” Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1288: 135‒152. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Uomini, Natalie T. 2015. “Paleoneurology and Behavior.” In Human Paleoneurology, ed. by E. Bruner, 121‒143. Cham (Switzerland): Springer.Google Scholar
Werner, Alice. 1973 [1904]. “Note on the Terms Used for “Right Hand” and “Left Hand” in the Bantu Languages.” In Right and Left: Essays on Dual Symbolic Classification, ed. by Rodney Needham, 427‒430. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Westmoreland, Peter. 2017. “A Philosophical Approach to the Concept of Handedness: The Phenomenology of Lived Experience in Left- and Right-Handers.” Laterality: Asymmetries of Body, Brain and Cognition 22 (2): 233‒255. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by (5)

Cited by five other publications

Stewart, Alex G. & Alan R. Millard
2023. The sinister story of a gauche deliverer and his corrie-fisted tribesmen: Ehud and the left-handed artillery. Laterality 28:2-3 ► pp. 192 ff. DOI logo
Pelkey, Jamin
2022. Cultural Symmetry: From Group Theory to Semiotics. In Handbook of Cognitive Mathematics, ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Pelkey, Jamin
2022. Cultural Symmetry: From Group Theory to Semiotics. In Handbook of Cognitive Mathematics, ► pp. 573 ff. DOI logo
Pelkey, Jamin
2024. The semiotic phenomenology of inverse alteroception. Cognitive Semiotics 17:1 ► pp. 7 ff. DOI logo
Li, Heng
2020. Less is more. Review of Cognitive Linguistics 18:2 ► pp. 519 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 21 september 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.