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The Iconicity And Non-Arbitrariness Of Body Locations In Four Unrelated Sign Languages, John Samson
The Iconicity And Non-Arbitrariness Of Body Locations In Four Unrelated Sign Languages, John Samson
Theses and Dissertations
In this thesis, I show that universally, there is a strong tendency for signs located on the body to have an iconic or non-arbitrary motivation, especially in their original form. I analyze sign language dictionaries from four unrelated sign languages and establish an iconic or non-arbitrary link between the form of the signs and their meaning, and classify those links according to 8 categories of body location iconicity and 3 categories of non-arbitrariness. The strength of this tendency depends on the percentage of signs that are shown to have an iconic or non-arbitrary link. For the data analyzed here this …