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Onomatopoeia and Sound Symbolism

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Onomatopoeia and Relevance

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Sound ((PASTS))

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Abstract

This chapter focuses on the sound-symbolism-based approach, which has been dominant in onomatopoeia research. It is often claimed in sound-symbolism research that there is a systematic or non-arbitrary link between sound and meaning. This view of onomatopoeia presents a particular challenge to de Saussure’s (1916) notion that the link between word, form, and meaning is completely arbitrary. However, it will be argued that the context dependency of onomatopoeia means that what appears to be a systematic link between sound and meaning is a result of humans’ inferential processes. Sound symbolism is a repertoire of links that humans are capable of making between sound and meaning, rather than such links existing independently of the human mind. This leads to the main relevance-theoretic analysis of onomatopoeia presented in Chap. 3.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    See Akita (2013b) for a fuller discussion of research development in sound-symbolism studies.

  2. 2.

    I will return to this point in Chap. 3.

  3. 3.

    http://www.writtensound.com/index.php?term=tack+tack+tack. Accessed 20 October 2017.

  4. 4.

    https://outlandishblog.com/about-high-heels/. Accessed 12 May 2019.

  5. 5.

    https://hellogiggles.com/fashion/stopped-high-heels. Accessed 20 October 2017.

  6. 6.

    In relevance theory, on which this study is based, metaphor or metonymy interpretation is seen as a pragmatic process, not a semantic process. I will return to the notion of semantic extension in Chap. 4.

  7. 7.

    Kanayama Kazuhiko ryu Chahan no gokui & Okazu no moto special. [Kazuhiko-Kanayama style, The secret of fried rice & other dishes (my translation)].

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  1. SALIS, Dublin City University SALIS, Dublin, Ireland

    Ryoko Sasamoto

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Sasamoto, R. (2019). Onomatopoeia and Sound Symbolism. In: Onomatopoeia and Relevance. Palgrave Studies in Sound. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-26318-8_2

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