LINGUIST List 2.706

Fri 25 Oct 1991

Disc: Onomatopenia

Editor for this issue: <>

Directory

1. "Bruce E. Nevin", Thud! sound symbolism
2. John E. Koontz, Re: Ejaculatives
3. Herb Stahlke, Re: 2.698 Queries
4. Nalini Rau, Re: 2.698 Queries
5. , Svlan! Plouf! Pan!
6. , Ejaculatives
7. , RE: Query Australian sound imitations

Alan Dench asks for a term for things like his "binj-binj-binj"
ringing noise. These are regularly termed "sound symbolism"
in the linguistics of Native America. I believe the term
stems from Sapir via Haas.
	Bruce Nevin
	bnbbn.com

Per A. Dench's inquiry concerning ejaculatives in Nyungar, I believe the
standard term is ideophone. See, for example, the Lingua Descriptive Series
outline/prospectus, or, particularly, the first (?) volume, dealing with
Hixkaryana. Robert Hsu, at the University of Hawaii has been conducting a
survey of ideophonic systems, and could probably recommend referencces on
the subject. His email address is t119920uhccmvs.bitnet.

Message 3: Re: 2.698 Queries

On Alan Dench's query on Bif! Bop! Kapow!
There is extensive literature in African linguistics on a class of
words, called ideophones, that look and function like the words Dench
lists. A good place to start would be with Chapter 15 "Adverbials,
Ideophones, Semantic Ranges" of William Welmers _African Language
Structures_ (University of California Press, 1973). An excellent
language-specific study of ideophones is Olayiwola Awoyale's 1973
Illinois dissertation "The Syntax and Semantics of Ideophones in
Yoruba."
Herb Stahlke
Ball State University

Message 4: Re: 2.698 Queries

Alan Dench asked for suggestions about the linguist expression to cover
words such as `derrku-derrku'
One could use the term `onomotopoeic'
Nalini Rau

Thankyou to those people who have already replied
to my posting about Bif! Bang! noise-words. To
forestall similar suggestions.
1.	I am aware that these terms are onomatopoeic
	but wanted a term which was more specific.
2.	I had understoof the term 'ideophone' to be
	at least more general than I wanted and to
	refer to a different kind of thing as primary sense.
Sorry if I gave the impression that all such words have to
do with sexual organs. This is not the case. My favourite
(though not from Nyungar - another Oz language) is 'Jirtun!'
the noise of someone's stomach exploding after they have
eaten that particular poisonous fish which is a delicacy
in Japan.
Alan Dench
Department of Anthropology
University of Western Australia
Nedlands WA 6009.

Evidently nothing as dry and sterile as "interjection" will suffice
so, I suggest one of these terms: "Conan-ism" or "Rambo-ism"

RE: Alan Dench's query about 'ejaculatives'
The word which immediately springs to mind for the phenomenon of verbal
sound-imitation is onomatopoeia. Mentioning this word in connection with
your query immediately drew 'onomatopenis' from my colleagues, but I
cannot be held responsible for their one-track minds (sigh).
By the way, the word is Greek for simply 'name-making'. 'Ejaculatives' would
indeed be inappropriate (terminologically speaking), as this is equivalent
to 'interjections', which includes greetings, curses like 'Hello', 'Damn',
which are not imitative of sound. I think it is a criterion for onomatopoeia
that they should imitate non-linguistic sounds, which can be human if they
are restricted to coughing, belching, snoring and the like, so not copying
someone's dialect or speech defects.
Richard Piepenbrock