**2. The biolinguistic hypotheses of world/structure instantiation: phonesthemes and syllables (from perspective into perspective)**

The following framework presents the results of an ongoing research that will appear in a book on this subject. The experiment consisted in the participation of 20 French EFL (English as a Foreign Language) and Berber language students (Kabyle Students taking Tachelhit language course at the INALCO/Paris) who have answered both an acquisition questionnaire and a multiple test including: a recognition test in three components (cognates, speech errors and co-selection couples), a narrative test (consonant clusters and semantic frames) and an acoustic test.

Grounding in the former background, we would like to present our hypotheses based on the frame of syllable iconicity and phonosthemes as world/structure schemes, distinguishing it from motivation being the praxeme of the world within *The Biolinguistic Instantiation: Form to Meaning in Brain/Syllable Interactions DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.89943*

the structure. Put in its semiotic frame, more precisely the frame of asymptotic semiosis (peircian iconicity) [21], prosodic [22] and linguistic iconicity [23, 24], though metaphorized by the firstness mode are nonetheless not overlapping the Peircian sense, that is to say the positivity of the presence in virtue of a certain first impression of world/perception analogy. Hence, Jakobsonian iconicity refers to the form miming form, or the form miming the meaning (exophoric vs endophoric terms of W.Nöth). linguistic iconicity relates doubly to other concepts and apprehension modes given the fact that the link between language (as a semiotic principle) and natural languages but also the link between natural languages and their proper actualization is not saturated, not entirely covering iconicity knowing that it relates variably to world references (virtual or actual ones) and to uttering/use relating to the orientation/schematization of the structure.

## **2.1 The gestural/neuronal mapping and schematization of the syllable**

### *2.1.1 The gestural/articulatory postulate*

• Secondly, the overlap and competition between gestures plays in both

the syntagmatic chain.

*Cognitive and Intermedial Semiotics*

a dynamic act.

**108**

*1.2.4 The point of view of instantiation*

approaches the role of a lexical device of distinctiveness in the representation. Beyond the debate between C/F theory and articulatory phonology, the precedence of the gestures implies the role of content or the segment as less deeper unit in the representation than gestures/syllable frame. From another perspective, namely the forming form (forma formans), formantization belong to the mapping of the enunciative-predicative meta-linguistic operations on

We refer herein to a distinction between analysis/structure and instantiation where the immanent/computational structure referring to its own abstraction/ articulation levels is schematic/system-based and instantiation is its counterpart, a formal system dynamics inscribing the world in the structure. Stated in these terms, instantiation is the condition of the double significance (Benveniste's semantic and semiotic significances) which would mean: first, syntactic determination (syntagmatic rules) and enunciative-predicative world/situation regulation. Secondly, systems enabling the formal presentification of the structure (social, biological, physical, etc.). On the other hand, beyond ontological-praxeological constitution of any signification [19] instantiation is not an active use of the structure oriented by pragmatic-communicative intention or causality but rather a mediation between a

manifestation level and its state of the world [20] understood in a non-

referentialist, non-causal perspective. It is the dynamic interpretable object of a semiotic utterance principle determined by both representation and regulation. In our morpho-dynamic approach, this mediation relates the continuous and the discontinuous as a *forming form* linking intentionality/bios and/or the unconscious to the structure. We assume that the presence of the structure does not depend on itself as for analysis/catalysis (derivation/deduction) but on these specific elements:

• Instance: level of the formal presence of language under the form of

Henceforth, we will refer to the biolinguistic instantiation as the biophysiological *symbolic* and *formal* dispositive in both its extra/intra-structural presence based on a hypothesis of schematization (predisposition/disposition).

**2. The biolinguistic hypotheses of world/structure instantiation: phonesthemes and syllables (from perspective into perspective)**

Students taking Tachelhit language course at the INALCO/Paris) who have answered both an acquisition questionnaire and a multiple test including: a recognition test in three components (cognates, speech errors and co-selection couples), a narrative test (consonant clusters and semantic frames) and an acoustic test. Grounding in the former background, we would like to present our hypotheses

based on the frame of syllable iconicity and phonosthemes as world/structure schemes, distinguishing it from motivation being the praxeme of the world within

The following framework presents the results of an ongoing research that will appear in a book on this subject. The experiment consisted in the participation of 20 French EFL (English as a Foreign Language) and Berber language students (Kabyle

• Instantiators: situational/positional taxemes, articulators/gestural principles, brain connections, drives … are active elements of the signifying process.

Based on the theoretical frame of both gestural/articulatory phonologies [25, 26], we consider that the syllable relies on both a gestural frame, discrete oppositions analyzed under schematic scores of natural classes upon which segmental content is realized. On the other hand, lexical access draws on gestural frames for the representation of distinctiveness suggesting dynamic parameters of articulatory events that could be relevant for typological selections (formants and possible specific contrasts) from the point of view of the target/pointing schemes of the tongue.

Evidence from acquisition but also neurobiological evidence (McNeilage) will be addressed in the following purpose. On the other hand, the fairly evidence of *C-center Effect* [27] of consonant initial phasing with the vowel and their counter coda (anti-phasing, intra-clustering and only postvocalic phasing of the first consonant) shows a clear gestural organization of syllable patterns producing the phonotactic structure but more widely suggesting that the computation of this phasing is to be found in both neural mirroring effect and dual stream models of speech processing.

#### *2.1.2 The neuronal postulate*

The discovery of Mirror neurons in Monkeys (F5 premotor and parietal area) by Rizzolati and Arbib [28] has led to the discovery of a system (MNS) or mirror regions supporting imitation and mapping of action onto cognition, important consequences on both motor/gestural systems have been found. Moreover, evidence stemming from pathological impairment perspective based on theoretical/ epistemological considerations is to be emphasized. To refer to some of the major contributions in this field, we can consider the following list: [29–37].

Beyond the good links between the MNS and current biolinguistic theories,<sup>2</sup> we would like to evoke two aspects relying on the distinction between *neural scheme* (signified) and the MNS (the signifier). Moreover, MNS hypothesis is the epistemological result of Arbib's Schema theory [38], it grounds neurocognition in a symbolic schematism of a sensory-motor component (or perceptual/active models). The model suggested by Arbib et al. may introduce the schematic basis embedded in its brain circuitry. Instantiation, likewise merge operations of the minimalist program [39] in its biolinguistic component, is a combination/assemblage of instances

<sup>2</sup> We should nonetheless notice some criticism coming from one of the two founding scientists of dual stream model of speech, namely Hicock, in the *Myth of Mirror Neurons: the Real Neuroscience of Communication and cognition*).

that map the Mirror Neurons onto the Mirror system. We reproduce herein Arbib's model [40]:

conceptual syllabary as posited by Brendel et al. [43] and the imitation component (motor, concept representation) [44]. Moreover, Vihman [45] argues that the acqui-

exponense/acoustic signal to segmental organization. The involvement of motor imi-

The Mental Syllabary Model in its form is related to psycholinguistic lexical access; it argues that speakers have access to high frequency syllables through a mental syllabic/lexical model that triggers motor representation. High/low frequency syllables (or the syllable frequency effect) are studied from the perspective of word-final syllable sensitiveness in the mental lexicon in respect to Naming

We postulate that the interaction of catalysis/analysis, processing/recognition shaping the acquisition draws on mirror neurons which enables mental syllable

To provide a brief definition of Hicock and Poeppel's Dual Stream Model of Speech [46–50], we will sum it up in the following: it is a model that seeks a neurofunctional anatomy of language based on the understanding of partly overlapping, partly distinct neural circuits: speech (perception) is believed to lie primarily [49] on neural circuits, bilaterally in the superior/temporal lobes whereas speech production relies on a fronto-parietal/temporal circuits (left hemisphere dominant). First designed to understand vision (ventral recognition/dorsal sensory-motor integration), it has become a model embedded in both normal/pathological understanding of the dorsal stream as responsible of phonological/prosodic translation of speech signals into articulatory representation in the frontal lobe, whereas the ventral stream (superior and middle portions of the temporal lobe) processes

A sub-hypothesis will help us work out the concept of biolinguistic instantiation

Evidence has been shown by the model (2007, 2012) that parts of the STS are important for representing phonological information during word processing: psycholinguistic variables such as **Phonological Neighborhood Density** or the number of words that sound similar to a target word. On the other hand, an interface (focal system) serves as a computational mediation mapping phonological representation and distributed conceptual representation; it is rather storage of relational

**3. The bio-syllable: from typological models in iconicity and**

**3.1 The phonological-prosodic (lexical) model of iconcity in English and**

We should first emphasize that we deal with iconicity in English and Berber from a phonological/prosodic perspective. English phonosthemes [51] belong to phonotactic clustering at the interface of phonological and prosodic derivation processes. They represent important clues for the lexicon (distinctiveness for instance), although they cannot be considered as morphs and they are not represented as such [52], they occur

sition of babbling patterns relies on an articulatory filter matching prosodic

*The Biolinguistic Instantiation: Form to Meaning in Brain/Syllable Interactions*

tation based on mirror system provides the empirical/theoretical framework.

mapping on perpectuo-motor/semantic sensitive frames of the lexicon.

**2.2 Dual stream model: connections and networks**

speech signals for comprehension (speech recognition).

Latency and its processing time.

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.89943*

within the bio-syllable frame:

**instantiation**

**111**

**Tachelhiyt Berber**

• Categorial recognition/processing:

information (isomorphism, form-to-form).

On the other hand, conceiving a grammar as the one called construction grammar by the model to address semantic operations of action and the mirroring implies for us, or better said for the model I seek to anchor in biolinguistics, the distinction between phonological/prosodic processes (analysis) of the syllable as being its proper form/structure (iconicity) and the semantic schematization (motivation) of structureto-meaning predisposition. We face, in this case, two hypothetical processes:

#### *2.1.3 Structure imitating structure*

It exists separately from acquisition and its MNS (mirror neuron system) thanks both gestural/computational and taxemic orientation of the syllables (class/inventory relations) embodying the potential catalysis and content placement in formantization. Thus, based on a neurocognitive model of an internal syllabary [41], we would like to term the bio-syllable that map the mirror system on both sequencing/phasing representations and their semantic instructions for both lexicon and syntax. In this case, the bio-syllable in the brain is the instantiation of the underlying scheme by mirror neurons enabling the semantic structure to imitate the phonological/prosodic structure.

Furthermore, the mirror model for the syllable suggests not only gestural/segment representation and lexical-semantic schematization but rather a gestural lexicon model of mirroring we will exemplify later on within English onset-coda clusters (/spl/, /zl/) or reduplication patterns in Berber, for instance (cacbv1c<sup>0</sup> bv1).

#### *2.1.3.1 An acquisition/recognition model*

The interaction between analysis/catalysis and recognition is based on the interactions of Working Memory/Long term Memory. It enables us to think out both acquisition/recognition models as an interaction between computational and conceptual/ cognitive components. Input/output relations rely on imitation models partly discussed by Billard and Arbib [42] that require a schematic assemblage (in our case, a

#### *The Biolinguistic Instantiation: Form to Meaning in Brain/Syllable Interactions DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.89943*

conceptual syllabary as posited by Brendel et al. [43] and the imitation component (motor, concept representation) [44]. Moreover, Vihman [45] argues that the acquisition of babbling patterns relies on an articulatory filter matching prosodic exponense/acoustic signal to segmental organization. The involvement of motor imitation based on mirror system provides the empirical/theoretical framework.

The Mental Syllabary Model in its form is related to psycholinguistic lexical access; it argues that speakers have access to high frequency syllables through a mental syllabic/lexical model that triggers motor representation. High/low frequency syllables (or the syllable frequency effect) are studied from the perspective of word-final syllable sensitiveness in the mental lexicon in respect to Naming Latency and its processing time.

We postulate that the interaction of catalysis/analysis, processing/recognition shaping the acquisition draws on mirror neurons which enables mental syllable mapping on perpectuo-motor/semantic sensitive frames of the lexicon.

#### **2.2 Dual stream model: connections and networks**

To provide a brief definition of Hicock and Poeppel's Dual Stream Model of Speech [46–50], we will sum it up in the following: it is a model that seeks a neurofunctional anatomy of language based on the understanding of partly overlapping, partly distinct neural circuits: speech (perception) is believed to lie primarily [49] on neural circuits, bilaterally in the superior/temporal lobes whereas speech production relies on a fronto-parietal/temporal circuits (left hemisphere dominant). First designed to understand vision (ventral recognition/dorsal sensory-motor integration), it has become a model embedded in both normal/pathological understanding of the dorsal stream as responsible of phonological/prosodic translation of speech signals into articulatory representation in the frontal lobe, whereas the ventral stream (superior and middle portions of the temporal lobe) processes speech signals for comprehension (speech recognition).

A sub-hypothesis will help us work out the concept of biolinguistic instantiation within the bio-syllable frame:

• Categorial recognition/processing:

Evidence has been shown by the model (2007, 2012) that parts of the STS are important for representing phonological information during word processing: psycholinguistic variables such as **Phonological Neighborhood Density** or the number of words that sound similar to a target word. On the other hand, an interface (focal system) serves as a computational mediation mapping phonological representation and distributed conceptual representation; it is rather storage of relational information (isomorphism, form-to-form).
