Perspective-shifts in event descriptions in Tamil child language
Narasimhan, Bhuvana and Gullberg, Marianne LU
(2006)
In Journal of Child Language
33(1).
p.99-124
- Abstract
- Children are able to take multiple perspectives in talking about entities and events. But the nature of children's sensitivities to the complex patterns of perspective-taking in adult language is unknown. We examine perspective-taking in four- and six-year-old Tamil-speaking children describing placement events, as reflected in the use of a general placement verb (veyyii ‘put’) versus two fine-grained caused posture expressions specifying orientation, either vertical (nikka veyyii ‘make stand’) or horizontal (paDka veyyii ‘make lie’). We also explore whether animacy systematically promotes shifts to a fine-grained perspective. The results show that four- and six-year-olds switch perspectives as flexibly and systematically as adults do.... (More)
- Children are able to take multiple perspectives in talking about entities and events. But the nature of children's sensitivities to the complex patterns of perspective-taking in adult language is unknown. We examine perspective-taking in four- and six-year-old Tamil-speaking children describing placement events, as reflected in the use of a general placement verb (veyyii ‘put’) versus two fine-grained caused posture expressions specifying orientation, either vertical (nikka veyyii ‘make stand’) or horizontal (paDka veyyii ‘make lie’). We also explore whether animacy systematically promotes shifts to a fine-grained perspective. The results show that four- and six-year-olds switch perspectives as flexibly and systematically as adults do. Animacy influences shifts to a fine-grained perspective similarly across age groups. However, unexpectedly, six-year-olds also display greater overall sensitivity to orientation, preferring the vertical over the horizontal caused posture expression. Despite early flexibility, the factors governing the patterns of perspective-taking on events are undergoing change even in later childhood, reminiscent of U-shaped semantic reorganizations observed in children's lexical knowledge. The present study points to the intriguing possibility that mechanisms that operate at the level of semantics could also influence subtle patterns of lexical choice and perspective-shifts. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/1611791
- author
- Narasimhan, Bhuvana
and Gullberg, Marianne
LU
- publishing date
- 2006
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- placement, event description, first language acquisition, perspective-taking, cause motion, Tamil
- in
- Journal of Child Language
- volume
- 33
- issue
- 1
- pages
- 99 - 124
- publisher
- Cambridge University Press
- external identifiers
-
- scopus:33344465714
- ISSN
- 1469-7602
- DOI
- 10.1017/S0305000905007191
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- no
- additional info
- The information about affiliations in this record was updated in December 2015. The record was previously connected to the following departments: Linguistics and Phonetics (015010003)
- id
- 9ffa21d8-1da3-4fbe-9f6e-efe79e6d2af3 (old id 1611791)
- date added to LUP
- 2016-04-04 08:56:43
- date last changed
- 2022-01-29 07:55:54
@article{9ffa21d8-1da3-4fbe-9f6e-efe79e6d2af3,
abstract = {{Children are able to take multiple perspectives in talking about entities and events. But the nature of children's sensitivities to the complex patterns of perspective-taking in adult language is unknown. We examine perspective-taking in four- and six-year-old Tamil-speaking children describing placement events, as reflected in the use of a general placement verb (veyyii ‘put’) versus two fine-grained caused posture expressions specifying orientation, either vertical (nikka veyyii ‘make stand’) or horizontal (paDka veyyii ‘make lie’). We also explore whether animacy systematically promotes shifts to a fine-grained perspective. The results show that four- and six-year-olds switch perspectives as flexibly and systematically as adults do. Animacy influences shifts to a fine-grained perspective similarly across age groups. However, unexpectedly, six-year-olds also display greater overall sensitivity to orientation, preferring the vertical over the horizontal caused posture expression. Despite early flexibility, the factors governing the patterns of perspective-taking on events are undergoing change even in later childhood, reminiscent of U-shaped semantic reorganizations observed in children's lexical knowledge. The present study points to the intriguing possibility that mechanisms that operate at the level of semantics could also influence subtle patterns of lexical choice and perspective-shifts.}},
author = {{Narasimhan, Bhuvana and Gullberg, Marianne}},
issn = {{1469-7602}},
keywords = {{placement; event description; first language acquisition; perspective-taking; cause motion; Tamil}},
language = {{eng}},
number = {{1}},
pages = {{99--124}},
publisher = {{Cambridge University Press}},
series = {{Journal of Child Language}},
title = {{Perspective-shifts in event descriptions in Tamil child language}},
url = {{https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/files/5217601/3912706.pdf}},
doi = {{10.1017/S0305000905007191}},
volume = {{33}},
year = {{2006}},
}