Do Letters Show You How They Sound?
It is a principle of most modern thought about language that the relation between signs and meanings is arbitrary. But a new study finds a connection between sounds and ink on "paper," says Alva Noë.
In a remarkable study published last week, Susan J. Styles of the University of Singapore and Nora Turoman of the University of Lausanne document evidence of iconicity in human writing systems.
Iconicity is when the signal — words or signs — shows you what it stands for, as when, for example, I make a scribbling gesture in the air to tell the waiter I want the bill, or I trace a rectangle in the air to indicate I need the menu. Iconicity is a commonplace of human face to face communication. Gesture, posture, tone of voice, we
