Behind the door: how Russian, Kazakh, and Armenian encode spatial relations with double-fronted objects
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: This paper explores how the concept of frontness is linguistically encoded in spatial constructions involving double-fronted objects, such as doors and windows, across three languages: Russian, Kazakh, and Armenian. Our analysis reveals significant cross-linguistic variation in how languages assign and interpret frontness in spatial expressions such as ‘in front of’ and ‘behind.’ Drawing on corpus data, field work with informants, and typological questionnaires, we show that the frontness of double-fronted objects such as doors and windows is not a universal feature, as one might have expected based on their experiential characteristics. Instead, spatial encoding varies across languages and appears to form different typological systems in this regard. Russian treats both doors and windows as fronted objects but only in two constructions – ‘in front of the door’ and ‘behind the window’, both referring to exterior location; Armenian assigns frontness primarily to windows; and Kazakh partially treats windows as fronted, while doors exhibit inconsistent patterns. These findings suggest that the encoding of spatial relations involving double-fronted objects forms a typologically diverse domain.
Source: Neophilologica 2019
Institution: Dartmouth College
Language: English
Subfield: Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W4417245375
FWCI:
Cites:
Cited by:
Related to: