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"Uphill" and "Downhill" in Tzeltal
Author(s) -
Brown Penelope,
Levinson Stephen C.
Publication year - 1993
Publication title -
journal of linguistic anthropology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.463
H-Index - 49
eISSN - 1548-1395
pISSN - 1055-1360
DOI - 10.1525/jlin.1993.3.1.46
Subject(s) - orientation (vector space) , cognition , face (sociological concept) , set (abstract data type) , cardinal direction , front (military) , sociology , cognitive psychology , psychology , epistemology , geography , computer science , philosophy , geometry , mathematics , social science , archaeology , neuroscience , meteorology , programming language
In the face of the prevailing assumption among cognitive scientists that human spatial cognition is essentially egocentric, with objects located in reference to the orientation of ego's own body (hence left/right, up/down, and front/back oppositions), the Mayan language Tzeltal provides a telling counter‐example. This article examines a set of conceptual oppositions in Tzeltal, uphill/downhill/across, that provides an absolute system of coordinates with respect to which the location of objects and their trajectories on both micro and macro scales are routinely described.