Cover -- Half-title -- Series-title -- Title -- Copyright -- Dedication -- Contents -- Figures -- Tables -- Preface -- Acknowledgements -- COMPANION BOOKS -- CHAPTER 1 The intellectual backround: two millennia of Western ideas about spatial thinking -- 1.1 THE GREAT EYE OPENER - DIFFERENCES IN SPATIAL RECKONING -- 1.2 IDEAS ABOUT SPATIAL COGNITION IN THE WESTERN TRADITION -- 1.2.1 Place and space, absolute and relative, in Western philosophy -- 1.2.2 The anthropocentric bias -- 1.2.3 Nativism and linguistic diversity -- 1.2.4 The centrality of spatial thinking in human psychology -- 1 .3 SYNOPSIS -- 1 .4 CONCLUSIONS -- CHAPTER 2 Frames of reference -- 2 .1 THE CONCEPT OF A SPATIAL FRAME OF REFERENCE -- 2.2 'FRAMES OF REFERENCE' ACROSS MODALITIES AND THE DISCIPLINES THAT STUDY THEM -- 2.3 LINGUISTIC FRAMES OF REFERENCE IN CROSS-LINGUISTIC PERSPECTIVE -- 2.3.1 The three linguistic frames of reference -- 2.3.1.1 Intrinsic frame of reference -- 2.3.1.2 Relative frame of reference -- 2.3.1.3 Absolute frame of reference -- 2.3.2 The 'logical structure' of the three frames of reference -- 2.3.3 Realigning frames of reference across is disciplines and modalities -- 2.4 MOLYNEUX'S QUESTION -- CHAPTER 3 Linguistic diversity -- 3 .1 AN OVERVIEW OF SPATIAL LANGUAGE -- 3.2 CONCEPTUAL DOMAINS UNDERLYING THE LANGUAGE OF SPACE -- 3.3 SOLUTIONS TO PLACE SPECIFICATION NOT INVOLVING FRAMES OF REFERENCE OR COORDINATE SYSTEMS -- 3.3.1 Placenames -- 3.3.2 Deictic systems -- 3.3.3 Topology -- 3.4 SOLUTIONS TO LOCATION DESCRIPTION UTILIZING FRAMES OF REFERENCE OR COORDINATE SYSTEMS -- 3.4.1 The vertical dimension -- 3.4.2 The horizontal plane -- 3.4.2.1 Intrinsic systems - towards a typologY -- 3.4.2.2 The relative frame of reference and its subtypes -- 3.4.2.3 The absolute frame of reference -- 3.4.3 The distribution of frames of reference in languages -- 3.5 MOTION.

3.6 THE GRAMMAR OF SPACE: PATTERNS OF LINGUISTIC CODING -- 3 .7 CONCLUSIONS -- CHAPTER 4 Absolute minds: glimpses into two cultures -- 4.1 GUUGU YIMITHIRR SPEAKERS OF HOPEVALE -- 4.1.1 Guugu Yimithirr communication about space -- 4.1.1.1 Guugu Yimithirr spatial description: the linguistic resources -- 4.1.1.2 The communicative use of cardinal direction information -- 4.1.2 The hypothesis of non-linguistic consequences -- 4.1.2.1 The essential prerequisite: orientation and mental maps -- 4.1.2.2 The non-linguistic coding of spatial scenes in memory and inference -- 4.2 TZELTAL SPEAKERS OF TENEJAPA -- 4.2.1 Background -- 4.2.2 Informal investigations of Tenejapan 'cognitive style' -- 4.2.3 Non-verbal memory and inference -- 4.2.3.1 Recall memory: the 'animals' task -- 4.2.3.2 Recognition memory: the 'chips' task -- 4.2.3.3 Motion-to-path transformation and recognition memory 'Eric's maze' task -- 4.2.3.4 Transitive inference -- 4.2.3.5 Discussion of the Tenejapan experiments -- 4 3 CONCLUSIONS -- CHAPTER 5 Diversity in mind: methods and results from a cross-linguistic sample -- 5 .1 LINGUISTIC INFLUENCES ON THINKING: TESTING THE HYPOTHESIS -- 5.2 METHODS -- 5.2.1 Methodological preliminaries -- 5.2.2 The gradient of spatial orientation -- 5.2.2.1 Properties of the gradient measure -- 5.3 OVERALL TEST OF THE CODING DIFFERENCE HYPOTHESIS -- 5.3.1 Situation-specific typing: performance across matched linguistic and non-linguistic tasks -- 5.3.2 The cross-situation prediction: from linguistic coding tendency to non-verbal coding -- 5.3.2.1 The populations -- 5.3.2.2 Procedure -- 5.3.2.3 Results -- 5.3.3 Pairwise comparisons between samples -- 5.3.3.1 Procedure -- 5.3.3.2 Results -- 5.4 LINGUISTIC VS. ECOLOGICAL/CULTURAL DETERMINISM: DIFFERENT SUBSAMPLES FROM THE SAME REGION -- 5.4.1 Two Tamil-speaking populations -- 5.4.1.1 Results.

5.4.2 Central Australia: Arrernte and English seakers -- 5.4.2.1 Results -- 5 .5 OTHER POSSIBLE DETERMINANTS OF NON-VERBAL CODING STRATEGY: GENDER, LITERACY AND CULTURAL CONSERVATISM -- 5.5.1 Gender -- 5.5.2 Literacy -- 5.5.3 Age, schooling and conservatism: indices of cultural change -- 5.5.4 Summary of the effects of intra-sample variables -- 5.6 ANOTHER POSSIBLE CONFOUND? THE 'BIG OUTDOORS' AND THE RELEVANCE OF LANDMARKS -- 5.6.1 The 180-degree 'absolute duck' conditions -- 5.6.1.1 Method -- 5.6.1.2 Result -- 5.6.1.3 Discussion -- 5.6.1.4 Method -- 5.6.1.5 Results -- 5 .7 A POSITIVE TEST OF LINGUISTIC DETERMINISM: THE CASE OF THE TZELTAL DEFECTIVE AXES -- 5.8 CORRELATION AND CAUSATION: CHICKEN OR EGG? -- 5.9 CONCLUSIONS -- CHAPTER 6 Beyond language: frames of reference in wayfinding and pointing -- 6 .1 THE ROLE OF LANGUAGE IN EVERYDAY HUMAN NAVIGATION -- 6.1.1 The nature of wayfinding abilities -- 6.1.2 The fall from grace: why are we such bad wayfinders? -- 6.1.3 Linguistic representations and human navigation -- 6.1.4 Dead reckoning abilities in relative vs. absolute communities -- 6.1.4.1 Three 'absolute' communities -- 6.1.4.2 Two 'relative' communities -- 6.1.4.3 Conclusions to dead reckoning experiments -- 6.2 GESTURE DURING SPEAKING: 'DEAD RECKONING' ON THE FLY -- 6.2.1 The general picture from experiment and observation -- 6.2.2 Distinctive properties of absolute gesture systems -- 6.2.2.1 The semiotics -- 6.2.2.2 Gesture morphology in absolute vs. relative gesture systems -- 6.2.3 Absolute gesture as an interactive system -- 6.2.4 Summary: absolute vs. relative gesture systems -- 6.2.5 Deixis and absolute gestures -- 6.3 DIFFERENT KINDS OF MENTAL MAPS -- 6.4 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS -- CHAPTER 7 Language and thought -- 7.1 TURTLE ALL THE WAY DOWN: MEMES AND MIND -- 7.2 THE RELATION BETWEEN LINGUISTIC AND CONCEPTUAL CATEGORIES.

7.3 NEO-WHORFINANISM -- 7.4 THE ACQUISITION OF LINGUISTIC FRAMES OF REFERENCE BY CHILDREN -- 7.5 UNIVERSALS VS. CULTURAL SPECIALIZATIONS -- 7.6 INNATE IDEAS VS. CO-EVOLUTION AND BIASES: OR HOW WE LOST OUR MENTAL COMPASS -- Notes -- 1 THE INTELLECTUAL BACK ROUND: TWO MILLENNIA OF WESTERN IDEAS ABOUT SPATIAL THINKING -- 2 FRAMES OF REFERENCE -- 3 LINGUISTIC DIVERSITY -- 4 ABSOLUTE MINDS: GLIMPSES INTO TWO CULTURES -- 5 DIVERSITY IN MIND: METHODS AND RESULTS FROM A CROSS-LINGUISTIC SAMPLE -- 6 BEYOND LANGUAGE: FRAMES OF REFERENCE IN WAYFINDING AND POINTING -- 7 LANGUAGE AND THOUGHT -- References -- Language index -- Author index -- Subject index.