Metonymies we sign by

Abstract According to Antonio Barcelona (2012) , metonymy is more than just a lexical phenomenon. It is a conceptual mechanism (an inferential schema) operating under the lexicon, in the lexicon, and above the lexicon. In light of the fact that “lexical metonymies are often at the same time grammatical and discourse metonymies” ( Barcelona 2012 : 254), we realize that metonymy is “a ubiquitous, multilevel phenomenon.” This is also in keeping with the Equipollence Hypothesis ( Ricardo Mairal-Usón & Francisco José Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez 2009 ; Ruiz de Mendoza & Alba Luzondo Oyón 2012 ), according to which cognitive and linguistic processes found to be at work in one domain of linguistic inquiry are expected to be active in other domains, too. The hypothesis is here extended to apply to all modes of communication, including pictorial and visuo-kinetic modalitites. This article first shows that, unsurprisingly, metonymy is also pervasive in signed languages and that it occurs at several levels or layers. Secondly, the study demonstrates that many of these metonymies are complex. Thirdly, the study argues that a number of metonymies are (no longer) recognized as such due to reductions of an excessively structuralist approach to sign languages.