Misrepresenting Epilinguistic ("Semovergent") Body Language As Protolinguistic

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 61):

Secondly, it is clear that not all forms of adult facial or bodily gesture that first arise in the protolanguage are assigned to the ‘protolinguistic body language’ category by Zappavigna and Martin (2018). The pointing gesture, for example, has already been discussed as arising in early protolanguage but becomes generalised during the transition to function in concert with a variety of ideational and interpersonal forms of linguistic (or paralinguistic) expression. This gesture is accordingly accepted by Zappavigna and Martin as semovergent and part of the textual metafunction. 

In addition, forms of mime that first arise within the imaginative microfunction of protolanguage (e.g. raising an imaginary cup to the lips) are recognised in Table 2.4 as ideational and so also within the semovergent paralanguage category. It is not therefore the case that having a clear origin in protolanguage is regarded by Zappavigna and Martin as sufficient grounds for classing an adult gesture as a protolinguistic ‘leftover’.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is the second of authors' arguments against Cléirigh's category of protolinguistic body language. Where the first argument was a false claim about what is wrongly included in the category, this second argument is a false claim about what is wrongly excluded from the category.

[2] This is misleading because it is not true. The protolinguistic category of body language includes all semiosis that does not require the evolution of language in the species and the development of language in the individual. See further below.

[3] To be clear, the reason why the pointing gesture is classified as epilinguistic by Cléirigh, and so as semovergent by his plagiarisers Zappavigna and Martin, is because its meaning as 'deictic identification' (p56) only emerges in the developmental transition to language, as the authors themselves acknowledge. The fact that it is not protolinguistic is demonstrated by the inability of other social semiotic species, such as rainbow lorikeets (Trichoglossus haematodus) to interpret a pointing gesture as referential.

[4] To be clear, the reason why mime is classified as epilinguistic by Cléirigh, and so as semovergent by his plagiarisers Zappavigna and Martin, is because it only emerges in the developmental transition to language, as the authors themselves acknowledge. The fact that it is not protolinguistic is demonstrated by its absence in other social semiotic species, such as rainbow lorikeets (Trichoglossus haematodus). 

But in any case, this 'let's pretend' function is of a very different nature to the expression of the ideational meanings of language in gesture for an addressee to understand, as in a game of Charades. As Halliday (2004 [1976]: 73) explains:

Finally we have the imaginative function, which is the function of language whereby the child creates an environment of his own. As well as moving into, taking over, and exploring the universe which he finds around him, the child also uses language for creating a universe of his own, a world initially of pure sound, but which gradually turns into one of story and make-believe and ‘let’s pretend’, and ultimately into the realm of poetry and imaginative writing. This we may call the ‘let’s pretend’ function of language.

[5] To be clear, as demonstrated above, the two examples of body language provided by the authors both arise only in the transition to language, and so do not qualify as protolinguistic body language.