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Universal 1181: ‘foot’ ⇒ ‘hand’

Posted in Universals Archive

Universal 1181: ‘foot’ ⇒ ‘hand’

Original
If there is a separate term for ‘foot’, then there is also one for ‘hand’, but not vice versa.
Standardized
IF there is a separate term for ‘foot’, THEN there is also one for ‘hand’.
Keywords
body parts
Domain
lexicon
Type
implication
Status
achronic
Quality
absolute
Basis
41 languages in Brown 1976 (12 American Indian languages, 10 European, 5 sub-Saharan African, 4 Mideastern and Western Asian, 5 Southeast Asian, 2 Chinese, 2 Micronesian)
Source
Brown 1976, also mentioned in Andersen 1978: 352
Counterexamples

One Comment

  1. FP
    FP

    1. The categories ‘foot’ and ‘hand’, which are often but not always labeled, never share the same label, in contrast to other ‘symmetrical’ parts of the uppeer and lower body, like ‘finger’/‘toe’. When these body parts are not labeled, the limbs are partioned at the point where the digits meet the hand or foot. (Andersen 1978) 2. Cf. #1500.

    1. May 2020

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