Abstract Co-present conversation is the primary habitat of human language and thus most probably constitutes an important locus of language change. However, language change is observable only at much larger timescales. How, then, is it possible to study the real-time conversational dimension of language change? In this paper, we argue that language documentation corpora, often covering spontaneous conversational language use, will constitute a crucial data source for such an endeavor, next to historical sources. We report two case studies illustrating the investigation of the mechanism of conversational priming in repetitional responses, where a responding interactant may repeat an innovative form used by the other interlocutor, which may in turn facilitate the spread of this innovation across a population.

Abstract This chapter argues for a decisive shift in corpus-building practices toward a Multimodal Turn . For decades, smaller-scale spoken and signed languages were less available for linguistic corpus research due to the scarcity of corpora, but the situation has changed: language documentation now provides rich multimodal resources, and many sign languages are recorded in high-definition video, offering unique insights into communicative practices. In contrast, corpora of majority languages often remain limited in video data. We contend that they can draw inspiration from the practices developed in language documentation and sign language research to close this gap. Only by systematically integrating multimodal interaction into corpus design can linguistic research capture the full complexity of human communication.

This article examines the question of whether complementation structures are cross-linguistically universal by using two different cross-linguistic corpora, each drawing on the same thirteen languages, spanning every continent. One is SCOPIC, the Social Cognition Parallax Interview Corpus, specifically designed to elicit material rich in grammatical categories relevant to social cognition; for each language in our sample this was balanced by a “general corpus” of roughly the same size with no specific targeting of domains. We find that, while complementation is widespread, it is not universal within the languages in our sample: in some it is absent entirely and in others it is extremely rare. Of the structural alternatives used to achieve the same functional goal by far the commonest is quoted speech, suggesting that in the evolution of linguistic structures it is heteroglossia, the embedding of one person’s words in another’s, that is a more basic phenomenon, from which complementation structures then evolve in many but not all languages.

This paper investigates the role of repeat format in contextualizing degrees of informativity in Yurakare (isolate, Bolivia) request for reconfirmation sequences. Requests for reconfirmation constitute a subtype of newsmarks, inviting at least a reconfirming response by the interlocutor. Across languages, there are two main competing formats for formulating requests for reconfirmation and other responsive actions in conversation: repeats and conventionalized formats such as response particles. Given that repeats restate (part of) a proposition while at the same time being informationally redundant, they have the capacity of explicitly spreading information across various turns. With these properties, repeats may potentially be employed in conversation to reduce peaks in information rate. This hypothesis is explored in this paper for Yurakare request for reconfirmation sequences. The results, however, suggest that repeat format in the request for reconfirmation and the reconfirming response does not participate in the contextualization of degrees of informativity in Yurakare request for reconfirmation sequences. (c) 2025 The Author. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).

In this paper, we investigate multimodal recipient feedback in casual dyadic conversation in four languages: German Sign Language, Russian Sign Language, spoken German, and spoken Russian. Taking a modality-agnostic and holistic approach, we investigate the composition of conversational feedback from different multimodal signals, comparing sign and spoken languages without prioritizing any of the articulators or modalities. We find that in sign and spoken languages alike, feedback events include non-manual signals such as head movements or facial expressions in 85% or more of the instances. Across modalities, all four languages show only small percentages of feedback events without any non-manual elements, and head nods constitute the most frequent feedback signal. Moreover, we model three empirically observed feedback styles ranging from a style employing a rich array of non-manual signals, over one comprising mostly head movements, to a style relying somewhat more on the talk-oriented forms. Our data demonstrate that the basic infrastructure for feedback is shared among signers and speakers, while at the same time, signers and speakers show different probabilities for using one style or another. On the basis of these patterns, we propose a gradient model of feedback styles that generates testable predictions for future work. Our study emphasizes the importance of investigating interactional phenomena from a holistic, multi-and cross-modal perspective. As vocal and manual signals account only for a relatively small percentage of the feedback signals employed by the signers and speakers in our study, a linguistic theory that focuses solely on vocal and/or manual behavior remains incomplete and fails to account for the largest part of feedback in conversation. This study highlights that non-manual signals are fundamental to feedback and conversation more broadly, and argues that theories of language must be reconceptualized, as purely speech-based accounts fail to capture the full complexity of human interaction. The findings have broader implications for theories of interaction and the Language Faculty: they underscore the need for models that integrate visual, non-manual, and interactional dimensions as constitutive elements of linguistic behavior. By highlighting the centrality of multimodal articulators in feedback production, this work contributes to a more comprehensive theory of human communicative interaction.

Is it true that 'grammars code best what speakers do most', as Du Bois suggested already in 1985? And do members of different cultures privilege talk about kinship relations to differing degrees? Could this be linked to the differential centrality of kinship to the vastly diverse grammars of the world's languages? We bring these three questions together in this study. Kinship relationships are central to the organisation of all human societies. Yet, we know little about what influences the frequency of reference to kin in spontaneous language use. In this study, we test factors that potentially associate with frequency of kin-term usage across 22 typologically diverse languages. Using a communicative task involving the description, arrangement and narration of pictures, we establish the proportion of human reference expressions formulated as kin terms in interactive language use and show that it does indeed differ across languages. We then examine candidate predictors for the usage frequency of kin-based lexical formulations (choice of word categories) by looking at (i) a structural variable ('kintax', the presence of grammatical means for encoding kinship in the language), (ii) a lexical variable (complexity of a subset of each language's kinship term system), (iii) a discourse variable (type of interaction a language user engages in at the time of speaking or signing), and (iv) a topicality variable (type of stimulus a language user references at the time of speaking or signing). We find all these to be relevant, but we focus on structural kintax. This provides a way of addressing Du Bois's hypothesis about the interaction between language structure and language use in human communication: the grammatical imprint of a language correlates with language users' word-choice patterns. We show that the more grammar you have for this semantic domain, the more you talk about it.

This article describes the resources employed by speakers of Yurakar & eacute; (isolate, Bolivia) for formulating and responding to requests for confirmation (RfCs). In Yurakar & eacute;, RfC turns are predominantly formatted with positive polarity and falling final intonation. Confirming responses to positive polarity RfCs and disconfirming responses to negative polarity RfCs with truth-conditional negation show a preference for repeat format. Moreover, Yurakar & eacute; exhibits a functional differentiation of repeat vs response token format in confirming responses to positive polarity RfCs, a repeat being the default format for plain confirmations of RfCs that introduce a new proposition into the discourse. The Yurakar & eacute; data presented in this article contribute to our knowledge of the cross-linguistic response possibility space, providing evidence for the capability of repeats to convey plain and unmarked confirming responses, contesting theories of interaction that propose response tokens to universally constitute the unmarked format for confirming responses across languages.

In this paper, we compare practices of formulating responses to requests for confirmation oriented toward confirmation but doing less or more than that in German and Yurakaré (isolate, Bolivia). The German particle joa is identified as a versatile resource for navigating the functional spectrum of such responses, being deployed for less than confirming in terms of epistemic or propositional downgrading, and for more than confirming in terms of addressing terms of questions or a confirmable’s valence. When exercising these specific tasks, speakers of Yurakaré, in contrast, rely mostly on repetitional strategies, while a highly specialised particle constitutes an ‘escape strategy’ when a repeat would convey unwanted implications. We propose that doing less and more than confirming is contingent on a more fundamental distinction: a preference for particles (German) vs. repeats (Yurakaré) in the realm of plain confirmation, which carries over to responses doing less and more than confirming.

This study is concerned with a cross-linguistic comparison of requests for reconfirmation (RfRCs) in Yurakaré, German, and Low German mundane spoken conversations. We focus on two different RfRC formats, namely token RfRCs (such as German echt? ‘really’) and RfRCs that repeat (part of) another speaker’s prior turn. We show that these RfRC formats are used to accomplish different social actions in the three languages under study, ranging from registering news to challenging prior information. Token RfRCs serve as versatile resources for responding to news in all three languages. Repeat RfRCs, in contrast, are used in divergent ways: In German, they are mainly treated as challenges, while showing only a weak contextualisation of challenges in Low German and virtually no potential for being understood as challenges in Yurakaré. Our study thus demonstrates that structurally similar RfRC formats can be put to use for different actions and sequence trajectories across languages.

In this article, we investigate if conversational priming in repetitional responses could be a factor in language change. In this mechanism, an interlocutor responds to an utterance by the other interactant using a repetitional response. Due to comprehension-to-production priming, the interlocutor producing the repetitional response is more likely to employ the same linguistic variant as the interlocutor producing the original utterance, resulting in a double exposure to the variant which, in turn, is assumed to reinforce the original priming effect, making the form more familiar to the repeating interlocutor. An agent-based model, with interactions shaped as conversations, shows that when conversational priming is added as a parameter, interlocutors converge faster on their linguistic choices than without conversational priming. Moreover, we find that when an innovative form is in some way favoured over another form (replicator selection), this convergence also leads to faster spread of innovations across a population. In a second simulation, we find that conversational priming is, under certain assumptions, able to overcome the conserving effect of frequency. Our work highlights the importance of including the conversation level in models of language change that link different timescales.

Abstract This chapter gives an overview of the expression of directed caused accompanied motion events in Yurakaré (isolate, Bolivia) spoken discourse. Building on previous descriptive work by van Gijn (2005, 2006, 2011b), the chapter sets a focus on discourse frequencies of the relevant constructions, including a detailed analysis of the contributions of semantics and pragmatics to the expression of the four defining meaning components (directedness, causation, accompaniment, motion). In addition, I examine the variability in interactants’ choice of expression when describing the same event, emphasizing different aspects of the event with their choice. I argue that interactional strategies such as self‑ and cross-speaker repetition can explain part of the variability by influencing discourse frequencies.

In Yurakaré (isolate, Bolivia) conversations, content questions containing question words based on the pro-form ama ‘who, which’ are frequently recruited for functions other than seeking information, among them the expression of strong assertions with reversed polarity. Assertive uses of content questions with the question word amaja ‘who, which (topic)’ present the information contained in the utterance as an indisputable fact rather than a subjective claim by the speaker. They are often employed in interaction to provide a justification for a potentially disputable claim, action, or stance. By connecting two utterances in this way, assertive questions with amaja contribute to textual connectivity in conversation.

There is a long tradition in linguistics of seeing each language as a powerful factor setting out predetermining grooves in how people express themselves. But how strong is this effect? We know that despite the forces of linguistic habit people nonetheless enjoy some freedom in formulating their thoughts. Can we measure the relative contributions of language structures and individual variation to how people formulate statements about the world? Do accounts of typological differences need to take individual variation into account, and is such variation more prevalent in some kinds of linguistic domains than others? In this paper, we deploy a parallax corpus across thirteen languages from around the world and explore four case studies of linguistic choice, two grammatical and two semantic. We assess whether differences are accounted adequately just by individual participant variation, just by language information, or whether taking into account both helps account for the patterns we see. We do this through comparisons of statistical models. Our results make it clear that participants using the same language do not always behave similarly and this is especially true of our semantic variables. We take this to be a strong caution that the behaviour of individual participants should be considered when making typological generalisations, but also as an exciting outcome that corpus typology as a field can help us account for intra- and inter-language variation.

Given that face-to-face interaction is an important locus for linguistic transmission (Enfield 2008: 297), it is argued in this paper that conversational structure must provide affordances (Gibson 1979) for transmitting linguistic items. The paper focuses on repeats where an interactant (partially) repeats their interlocutor's preceding utterance. Repeats are argued to provide affordances for the transmission of innovative and conservative linguistic items by forcing interactants to repeat linguistic material uttered by another person, facilitating production by exploiting priming effects. Moreover, repeats leave room for modification and thereby for actively resisting transmission. In this way, repeats unite the competing forces (Tantucci et al. 2018) of automaticity and creativity. To support this claim, this paper investigates the use of Spanish insertions and alternative variants in utterance-repeat pairs in Yurakare (isolate, Bolivia) conversations. The findings are compatible with a holistic view of language where all linguistic levels are interconnected (Beckner et al. 2009).

This paper outlines a method for studying the sequential distributions of epistemic markers with the purpose of gaining insight into their interactional functions. The method is exemplified with a case study of two epistemic markers of Yurakare (isolate, Bolivia), =la "commitment" and =se "presupposition". The investigation reveals that the two markers show different distributions across initial and responsive utterances. Moreover, each marker functions differently when used in initial utterances and responses. It is argued that these distributions show that the interactional functions of the two markers go beyond the marking of commitment and presupposition, and that they contrast in terms of two scales, one capturing the poles of "highly initiating" and "highly responsive", the other concerning high vs. low degrees of "thematic agency". While the commitment marker =la is associated with the responsivity pole and with a low degree of thematic agency, the presupposition marker =se shows a tendency toward the initiating pole and toward a high degree of thematic agency. These findings then support the view that epistemic markers are employed to co-construct epistemic perspectives in interaction rather than to make explicit some internal epistemic state held by the speaker.

This article makes the case for the universality of the sequence organization observable in informal human conversational interaction. Using the descriptive schema developed by Schegloff (2007), we examine the major patterns of action-sequencing in a dozen nearly all unrelated languages. What we find is that these patterns are instantiated in very similar ways for the most part right down to the types of different action sequences. There are also some notably different cultural exploitations of the patterns, but the patterns themselves look strongly universal. Recent work in gestural communication in the great apes suggests that sequence organization may have been a crucial route into the development of language. Taken together with the fundamental role of this organization in language acquisition, sequential behavior of this kind seems to have both phylogenetic and ontogenetic priority, which probably puts substantial functional pressure on language form.

In this paper, we investigate the uses of the clausal nominalizer =ti in Yurakare, a linguistic isolate spoken in Bolivia. Clauses nominalized with =ti can serve a variety of functions: filling an argument position, relativization, forming the complement of a complement-taking verb, and expressing adverbial modification. On the basis of synchronic spoken corpus data, we propose a grammaticalization path for =ti. We argue that its most plausible source is the demonstrative ati, thus suggesting that =ti is a demonstrative-based nominalizer. Further, we show that =ti has developed a range of insubordinate uses, indicating 'intersubjective commitment'. We propose that from there, =ti is currently on its way toward becoming a stance marker, contrasting with other clause-final enclitics of Yurakare.

This chapter argues that the synchronic uses of the Yurakaré (isolate, central Bolivia) polyfunctional suffix ‑shi plausibly reflect a diachronic path of semantic extension, first from a derivational suffix expressing similarity to an uncertain visual/perceptual evidential, and from there to an inferential evidential. Evidence for this claim comes from the correlation of the properties of the synchronic uses with well-known tendencies of semantic change, and from a sociolinguistic analysis of the synchronic uses of ‑shi. A cross-linguistic comparison further shows that there are various other languages with a similar evidential marker. For some of these languages, similar paths of diachronic development are plausible.