Cornelia Ebert
Biographic Data
| ID | 6917800 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Cornelia Ebert |
| GIVEN NAMES | Cornelia |
| FAMILY NAME | Ebert |
| SIGNATURE | EBERT C |
| AFFILIATIONS | Goethe University Frankfurt |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-0515-882X |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 10 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 1 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 10 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2010 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Visual Components to Interpretation—Formal Approaches to Visible Meaning
Visual components of communication interact with the core linguistic system at all levels and make an important contribution to the meaning of the utterance expressed. This does not only apply to sign languages, which exclusively rely on the visual channel, but also co‐speech gestures and emojis, which are visual means that accompany and enhance spoken and written languages respectively. Visual meaning components often have iconic properties and …
The information status of iconic enrichments
Linguistic structures can contribute different types of meaning alongside standard assertions, such as conventional implicatures and presuppositions, which have long been described as being non-at-issue meaning contributions. Although information status has long been handled as a binary opposition between non-at-issue and at-issue content, recent research suggests that a gradient approach may be more appropriate. Building on new – and in the form…
Iconicity and gradient at-issueness
In our target article, we made the claim, based on experimental data on gestures and ideophones, that at-issueness is not a binary notion, but rather a gradient one. We showed how various factors can cause iconic enrichments to fall at different points along a scale of at-issueness. We then proposed a formalisation of this concept of at-issueness based on relevance to the Question Under Discussion (QUD). The responses to our article are, we hope,…
Semantics of Gesture
Current formal semantic theories aim at capturing gestural semantic contributions and in particular their interplay with the semantics that stems from cooccurring speech. To grasp how gesture contributes meaning and interacts with speech, the information status of gesture is of prime importance. This article gives an overview of the different conceptions of the information status of gestures that have been put forth and discusses the empirical pr…
The at-issue status of ideophones in German
Formal linguistics generally assumes that form-meaning relations in spoken language are arbitrary and not iconic. Ideophones, such as the English splish-splash have been considered exceptions to this rule of arbitrariness. Recently, however, researchers have begun to examine iconicity in spoken language more closely. Following work which established the default not- at-issue status of iconic co-speech gestures, here we discuss the crosslinguistic…
On the Interaction of Gestural and Linguistic Perspective Taking
In this paper, we investigate the question of whether and how perspective taking at the linguistic level interacts with perspective taking at the level of co-speech gestures. In an experimental rating study, we compared test items clearly expressing the perspective of an individual participating in the event described by the sentence with test items which clearly express the speaker’s or narrator’s perspective. Each test item was videotaped in tw…
Antonym adjective pairs and prosodic iconicity
While the general assumption has long been that natural languages exhibit an arbitrary pairing of form and meaning, there is increasing empirical evidence that iconicity in language is not uncommon. One example from spoken language involves iconic prosodic modulation, i.e. the changing of prosodic features such as duration and fundamental frequency to express meanings such as size and speed. In this paper, we use data from an English social media…
A comparison of sign language with speech plus gesture
Comparison of "Fei" and "Aber"
This paper compares the modal particle fei (Schlieben-Lange, 1979; Thoma, 2009)with the modal particle/sentence adverb aber (not to be confused with the conjunction aber,‘but’). Intuitively, both items express some form of contrast and correction. We will show thatboth are special among discourse particles in the following sense: They make a contributionthat is interpreted at a level distinct from the level where at-issue content (Potts, 2005) is…
Quantificational Variability Effects with Plural Definites
In this paper, we discuss the fact that not only adverbially quantified sentences with singular indefinites or bare plurals but also ones containing plural definites show Quantificational Variability Effects (QVEs), that is, they receive readings according to which the quantificational force of the respective DP seems to depend on the quantificational force of the Q-adverb. We show that if the Q-adverb is a frequency adverb like usually, there is…
Semantics of Gesture
Current formal semantic theories aim at capturing gestural semantic contributions and in particular their interplay with the semantics that stems from cooccurring speech. To grasp how gesture contributes meaning and interacts with speech, the information status of gesture is of prime importance. This article gives an overview of the different conceptions of the information status of gestures that have been put forth and discusses the empirical pr…
Quantificational Variability Effects with Plural Definites
In this paper, we discuss the fact that not only adverbially quantified sentences with singular indefinites or bare plurals but also ones containing plural definites show Quantificational Variability Effects (QVEs), that is, they receive readings according to which the quantificational force of the respective DP seems to depend on the quantificational force of the Q-adverb. We show that if the Q-adverb is a frequency adverb like usually, there is…
A comparison of sign language with speech plus gesture
Comparison of "Fei" and "Aber"
This paper compares the modal particle fei (Schlieben-Lange, 1979; Thoma, 2009)with the modal particle/sentence adverb aber (not to be confused with the conjunction aber,‘but’). Intuitively, both items express some form of contrast and correction. We will show thatboth are special among discourse particles in the following sense: They make a contributionthat is interpreted at a level distinct from the level where at-issue content (Potts, 2005) is…
Antonym adjective pairs and prosodic iconicity
While the general assumption has long been that natural languages exhibit an arbitrary pairing of form and meaning, there is increasing empirical evidence that iconicity in language is not uncommon. One example from spoken language involves iconic prosodic modulation, i.e. the changing of prosodic features such as duration and fundamental frequency to express meanings such as size and speed. In this paper, we use data from an English social media…
On the Interaction of Gestural and Linguistic Perspective Taking
In this paper, we investigate the question of whether and how perspective taking at the linguistic level interacts with perspective taking at the level of co-speech gestures. In an experimental rating study, we compared test items clearly expressing the perspective of an individual participating in the event described by the sentence with test items which clearly express the speaker’s or narrator’s perspective. Each test item was videotaped in tw…
The at-issue status of ideophones in German
Formal linguistics generally assumes that form-meaning relations in spoken language are arbitrary and not iconic. Ideophones, such as the English splish-splash have been considered exceptions to this rule of arbitrariness. Recently, however, researchers have begun to examine iconicity in spoken language more closely. Following work which established the default not- at-issue status of iconic co-speech gestures, here we discuss the crosslinguistic…
The information status of iconic enrichments
Linguistic structures can contribute different types of meaning alongside standard assertions, such as conventional implicatures and presuppositions, which have long been described as being non-at-issue meaning contributions. Although information status has long been handled as a binary opposition between non-at-issue and at-issue content, recent research suggests that a gradient approach may be more appropriate. Building on new – and in the form…
Iconicity and gradient at-issueness
In our target article, we made the claim, based on experimental data on gestures and ideophones, that at-issueness is not a binary notion, but rather a gradient one. We showed how various factors can cause iconic enrichments to fall at different points along a scale of at-issueness. We then proposed a formalisation of this concept of at-issueness based on relevance to the Question Under Discussion (QUD). The responses to our article are, we hope,…
Semantics of Gesture
Current formal semantic theories aim at capturing gestural semantic contributions and in particular their interplay with the semantics that stems from cooccurring speech. To grasp how gesture contributes meaning and interacts with speech, the information status of gesture is of prime importance. This article gives an overview of the different conceptions of the information status of gestures that have been put forth and discusses the empirical pr…
Visual Components to Interpretation—Formal Approaches to Visible Meaning
Visual components of communication interact with the core linguistic system at all levels and make an important contribution to the meaning of the utterance expressed. This does not only apply to sign languages, which exclusively rely on the visual channel, but also co‐speech gestures and emojis, which are visual means that accompany and enhance spoken and written languages respectively. Visual meaning components often have iconic properties and …
Linguistics (9 works) · Computer Science (8 works) · Hearing Impairment and Communication (8 works) · Artificial Intelligence (5 works) · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition (5 works) · Multisensory perception and integration (5 works) · Philosophy (5 works) · Gesture (4 works) · Iconicity (4 works) · Mathematics (4 works)