Maria Kyuseva (University of Surrey), Daria Ryzhova, Ekaterina Rakhilina, Tatiana Reznikova (HSE University) Parts of the body: New insights into cross-linguistic variation

We discuss cross-linguistic variation in the usage of the body part terms within the frame-based approach to lexical typology (Rakhilina & Reznikova 2016). We contribute to the extensive body of research by providing a detailed analysis of one type of contexts in which body part terms appear, i.e., non-semiotic bodily movements, such as to cross the hands behind the back, to cover the face with the hands, etc. We find that different languages use different body part terms to describe the same bodily movement. The choice of the term depends on a range of conditions, including the inventory of the available terms, the сhoice of the linguistic construction, and the degree of conventionalisation. We take this as evidence for an additional aspect of the meaning of a body part term, which has been largely ignored in the previous typological literature. This aspect is the set of semantic restrictions on constructions in which the body part term can appear. We argue that it needs to be addressed in order to ensure the exhaustive cross-linguistic description of this semantic domain.