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#150266 11/15/05 11:58 AM
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What is the word to describe words that are representation of sound? like "boink", "ahem"... etc.

#150267 11/15/05 12:03 PM
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#150268 11/15/05 12:37 PM
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Thanks!

It was told to me three years ago, but long words have a nasty habit to elude me.

#150269 11/15/05 01:31 PM
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Since I feel in a speculative mood today, I wonder if there is a term for the very possibility of articulating an unarticulated sensory impression in the same "channel", so to speak (words for sounds both address the auditory channel, but I am hard pressed to find a visual analog of onomatopoeia - not to speak of the olfactory pathway..)

#150270 11/15/05 02:14 PM
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> visual

you mean something (other than words - an actual, physical object) that looks like what it sounds like? or sounds like what it looks like?


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#150271 11/15/05 02:16 PM
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Iconic? for signs that look like what they signify.


Ceci n'est pas un seing.
#150272 11/15/05 08:32 PM
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M-W has iconicity - correspondence between form and meaning <the iconicity of the Roman numeral III>

#150273 11/16/05 12:22 AM
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> looks like what it sounds like? or sounds like what it looks like?

Like the letter 'o', right? That sounds round, looks round and you make your mouth round to get it. I find this topic (letters > articulation > sound) fascinating but have read little associated with it as yet. I'm guessing most would agree that the shape of letters in phonetic alphebets are not entirely abstract though.

..now I've stumbled on the following...lots of reading:-)
THE ARTICULATORY BASIS OF THE ALPHABET

#150274 11/16/05 01:16 AM
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Pretty neat, by. It says it's from Becoming Loquens: what is loquens, please?

#150275 11/16/05 01:30 AM
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Quote:

> looks like what it sounds like? or sounds like what it looks like?

Like the letter 'o', right? That sounds round, looks round and you make your mouth round to get it.



well, I was thinking he meant something more like ball or tree...

Quote:

I find this topic (letters > articulation > sound) fascinating but have read little associated with it as yet. I'm guessing most would agree that the shape of letters in phonetic alphebets are not entirely abstract though.

..now I've stumbled on the following...lots of reading:-)
THE ARTICULATORY BASIS OF THE ALPHABET




pretty interesting stuff... and this crazy site happened to come up next to it in my tab bar... cue twilight zone music


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