A cross-linguistic approach to the formal and functional features of recurrent gestures: shrugging in 5 languages

International audience; The aim of this paper is to uncover formational features emerging with the conventionalization of recurrent gestures (Ladewig 2014, Müller 2017), in terms of their physiological bases and their relation to function. We thus illustrate how the joint limits of at least one of the segments (head, shoulder, arm, forearm, hand or fingers) and articulatory constraints between segments, are key to the stabilization of gestures’ form and function. We chose to focus on a specific composite gesture, the shrug, in order to conduct a cross-linguistic kinesiological analysis of gesture forms and their association to function. A cross-linguistic investigation was conducted on a collection of prototypical shrugs captured in context in English, French, Russian, German and French sign language (Polimod project, Cienki & Irishkhanova 2018, CoLaJE project, Morgenstern & Parisse, 2012).In order to identify the formational and functional invariant features of this composite gesture, we annotated all the extracts using a kinesiological coding system based on the form and the function of the gestures in context (Boutet 2001; Boutet et al., 2016). Our results indicated that there are associations between the uses of specific formational components and specific functions across languages.The complex formational pattern of the shrug, which comprises the open fingers, hands, arms, lifted shoulders and the tilting of the head, is supported by an association between form and function. Thus, throughout young children’s gestural development over time, shrugs are first used to refer to absence with the hands (palm up and extension of the forearm), then affective stance (“I don’t care” with the forearms, shoulder lift) and then epistemic stance (with head tilts) (Beaupoil & Debras, 2018). On a formational and structural level, in both our child and adult data, a core feature of the shrug was found to be related to the articulation of the arm’s movement, circulating along the upper limb. This core feature is related to the generic expression of incapacity. As the flow of the gesture ascends to the shoulders, it is transferred into a shoulder lift which expresses more subjectivity and stance. As it descends to the palms, it is transferred into an exterior rotation of the forearms (opening gesture) and into an extension that ends in a supination (palm up configuration) which expresses absence or non-intervention. We found cross-linguistic typological differences in the use of the various segments (hand, arm, forearm, hand, shoulder, head), in their combination and their amplitude.This study of a recurrent gesture illustrates how the articulatory constraints between segments can restrict and structure the formational/physiological expansion of recurrent gestures by enclosing them in a stabilized frame. Human physiology and the productivity of its constraints are a key factor in the conventionalization of gestures and thus in the dynamic process that transforms sensori-motor experience into symbolic communicative representation via continual human interaction.ReferencesBeaupoil-Hourdel P. & Debras C. (2017). Developing communicative postures: The emergence of shrugging in child communication. Language Interaction & Acquisition (LIA) 8(1), p. 91-118.Boutet, D. (2001). Approche morpho-dynamique du sens dans la gestuelle conversationnelle. Université de Paris VIII, Paris.Boutet, D., Morgenstern A., Cienki A. (2016). Grammatical Aspect and Gesture in French: a kinesiological approach. Vestnik RUDN. 20, 3. 131-150.Cienki, A., & Iriskhanova, O. K. (2018). Aspectuality cross Languages Event construal in speech and gesture (John Benjamins). Amsterdam, Philadelphia: Alan Cienki & Olga K. Iriskhanova.Ladewig, S. (2014). Recurrent gestures. In C. Müller, A. Cienki, E. Fricke, S. Ladewig, D. McNeill & J. Bressem (Eds.), Body - Language - Communication (HSK) (Vol. 38.2, pp. 1558-1574): de Gruyter.Morgenstern, A., & Parisse, C. (2012). The Paris Corpus. Journal of French Language Studies, 22(Special Issue 01), 7-12.Müller, C. (2017). How recurrent gestures mean. Gesture, 16(2), 277-304.