Tracing the semantic development of Hebrew clicks

Abstract

This paper describes six functions of clicks in Hebrew interaction, some of which have also been identified in other languages: frame-shifting at discourse unit boundaries; signaling word searches; expressing negative affect; negating statements or implications thereof. Two new functional categories are introduced: marking other-repair (only clicks involving self-repair have been described so far), and indicating ‘oblique responses’, a type of dispreferred response. Clicks in different functions exhibit different degrees of liminality/conventionalization. This, and the considerable overlap between functions, is proposed as evidence for diachronic development over a semantic map, explaining why clicks perform a similar range of functions in unrelated languages around the world.