Children's Gestures from 18 to 30 Months
Author
Summary, in English
Considerable attention is paid to the even more basic question of what sort of actions qualify for the label "gesture". Instead of treating gestural qualities as a matter of a binary distinction between actions counting as gesture and those that do not, a multi-level approach is advocated. This approach allows for descriptions of gestures in terms of several different levels of complexity. Furthermore, a distinction is made between levels of communicative explicitness on the one hand, and levels of semiotic complexity on the other. This distinction allows for the recognition that some gestural actions are semiotically complex, without being explicitly communicative, and vice versa: that some gestural actions are explicitly communicative, without being semiotically complex. The latter is particularly consequential for this thesis, since a large number of communicative gestural actions reside in the borderland between practical action and expressive gesture. Hence, the gestures analyzed include not only the prototypical "empty-handed" gestures, but also gestures that involve handling of physical objects. Overall, the role of conventionality in children's gestures is underscored.
The approach is (a) cognitive in the sense that it pays attention to the knowledge and bodily skills involved in the performance of the gestures, (b) social and interactive in the sense that it views gestures as visible and accountable parts of mutually organized social activities, and (c) semiotic in the sense that the analysis tries to explicate how signification is brought about, in contrast to treating the meanings of gestures as transparently given, the way participants themselves often do when engaged in social interaction.
Department/s
Publishing year
2010
Language
English
Publication/Series
Travaux de l'Institut de Linguistique de Lund
Volume
50
Full text
Document type
Dissertation
Publisher
Centre for Languages and Literature, Lund University
Topic
- Languages and Literature
Keywords
- children
- gesture
- development
- communication
- language
- action
- semiotics
- social cognition
Status
Published
Supervisor
ISBN/ISSN/Other
- ISSN: 0347-2558
- ISBN: 978-91-628-8178-8
Defence date
20 November 2010
Defence time
10:15
Defence place
Övre Palaestra, Universitetsplatsen, Paradisgatan 4, Lund
Opponent
- Adam Kendon (Professor)