Embodied Languages: The Case of Quechua and Other Languages that Move the Body

When speaking is not only thinking — it is sensing, moving, and existing within territory

For a long time, Western science treated language mainly as a mental system: a symbolic structure used by the brain to represent ideas.

However, in recent decades, research in cognitive linguistics, anthropology, and neuroscience has revealed something deeper:

speaking also involves the body.

Words do not merely describe the world.
They organize movement, perception, emotion, and social interaction.

This perspective belongs to a field often called embodied cognition.

Some of the most interesting examples of this phenomenon appear in Indigenous languages of the Americas.

Language and the body

When humans speak, they are not only activating abstract symbolic systems.

Language processing also engages neural networks related to:

• movement

• sensory perception

• emotion

• bodily memory

Neuroscientific studies have shown that words related to actions or sensations activate motor and sensory areas of the brain.

This suggests that language is not purely symbolic.
It is partly grounded in bodily experience.

In many cultures, this connection between language and bodily experience is even more explicit.

The case of Quechua

Quechua, a language family spoken by millions of people across the Andes, offers an interesting perspective from a cognitive point of view.

In many Quechua varieties, the structure of a sentence requires the speaker to indicate how they know what they are saying.

Speakers often mark whether information was:

• directly seen

• heard from someone else

• inferred from evidence

This linguistic feature is known as evidentiality.

It requires speakers to constantly acknowledge the source of their knowledge.

From a cognitive perspective, this creates a strong link between language, perception, and epistemic responsibility.

Speaking becomes not just a description of reality, but a recognition of how experience entered the body and perception of the speaker.

Language as bodily practice

In many Indigenous cultures, language is not simply verbal communication.

It is integrated with:

• gestures

• rhythm

• bodily posture

• environmental awareness

• collective interaction

In this sense, speaking can involve movement and spatial orientation.

Certain expressions depend on ecological knowledge, spatial relationships, and environmental awareness.

Language becomes part of a larger system connecting body, community, and territory.

Body-territory

Many Indigenous philosophical traditions describe humans as inseparable from their environment.

Rather than seeing the body as isolated, these perspectives view humans as part of a relational ecological network.

This perspective has been described by several Indigenous scholars through the concept of body-territory.

Within this framework, language is not simply symbolic representation.

It is a relational activity embedded in territory and community.

Speaking involves situating oneself within a living network of relationships.

Language and cognitive reorganization

Understanding language as embodied has important implications for neuroscience.

If language activates sensory and motor systems, then words can influence:

• posture

• attention

• emotional regulation

• perception

Narratives may therefore reorganize not only thought but physiological states of the organism.

This idea connects with several themes discussed earlier in this series:

• semantic repetition

• belief updating

• interoceptive regulation

• Zone 1, Zone 2, and Zone 3 cognitive states

Language can open space for cognitive flexibility — or reinforce rigid interpretations.

Implications for neuroscience

Embodied languages raise important research questions.

For example:

• Do languages with strong evidential systems alter attention and memory processing?

• Do different linguistic structures modulate N400 or P600 responses during comprehension?

• Do collective linguistic practices increase inter-brain synchrony in groups?

• Can languages grounded in ecological perception influence interoceptive awareness?

Studying these questions may help clarify how language interacts with bodily systems in shaping cognition.

Toward a more plural science

For centuries, the scientific study of language has focused primarily on European languages.

However, the world contains thousands of languages, each offering unique ways of organizing human experience.

Indigenous languages of the Americas, Africa, and Asia may provide important insights into:

• perception

• cognition

• memory

• relationships between body and environment

Incorporating these perspectives does not weaken scientific rigor.

Instead, it expands the field of inquiry.

A final reflection

Perhaps speaking is not only a way of expressing thoughts.

Perhaps speaking is also a way of moving the body within the world.

If that is the case, studying language means more than studying words.

It means studying how human beings sense, inhabit, and organize reality through language.

References (post-2021)

Guimarães, D. S. (2023). Indigenous Psychology as a General Science for Escaping the Snares of Psychological Methodolatry.
Contribution: Proposes that psychological science should integrate Indigenous epistemologies and embodied cultural processes.

Baniwa, G. (2023). Indigenous History in Independent Brazil.
Contribution: Explores Indigenous knowledge systems and their relationship with territory, identity, and collective memory.

Benites, S. (2022–2024). Research on Guarani cosmology and territorial knowledge.
Contribution: Discusses the relationship between language, territory, and lived experience in Indigenous epistemologies.

Monaco, E., et al. (2023). Embodiment of action-related language in the native and a foreign language: An fMRI study. Brain and Language.
Contribution: Demonstrates that language activates sensorimotor brain systems associated with bodily actions.

Candia-Rivera, D. (2022). Brain–heart interactions in the neurobiology of consciousness. Trends in Cognitive Sciences.
Contribution: Shows how physiological bodily signals interact with cognitive and emotional processes.

Santamaría-García, H., et al. (2024). Allostatic interoceptive overload across psychiatric and neurological disorders. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews.
Contribution: Explains how bodily regulation systems influence cognition and emotional interpretation.