Okay, here's part of my talk on OOO for tomorrow. I'm arguing that real objects enter into language all the time, most conspicuously in the form of onomatopoeia. We all know guns go bang in English and pan in French, but in neither do they go squish. Something real is translated.
Maybe it's simply that the acid hasn't worn off yet but I'm convinced that onomatopoeia can cover a lot more than mere sound. Why not? If language can translate objects, then sound can translate smell etc.
So I'll start off this list, which I hope we will all expand (to make this post into a monstrous hybrid far bigger than any other post on this blog). I'll start with what I'm calling visual onomatopoeia:
glitter
sparkle
shimmer
twinkle
scintillate
Of course this also leads to fascinating interstitial onomatopoeia. Here are some between seeing and hearing:
sputter
clatter
splat
Come on readers, it's fun!
2 comments:
Scan down this page
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jlawler/
for "sound symbolism." Lawler's work is evidence about what meanings do get directly into language.
Thanks Bill!
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