Japanese sound symbolism

File:Jaan! in Hakui.jpg

An example of Japanese sound symbolism,

The Japanese language has a large inventory of sound symbolic or mimetic words, known in linguistics as ideophones.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Such words are found in written as well as spoken Japanese.Template:Sfn Known popularly as onomatopoeia, these words do not just imitate sounds but also cover a much wider range of meanings;Template:Sfn indeed, many sound-symbolic words in Japanese are for things that make no noise originally, most clearly demonstrated by .

Categories

The sound-symbolic words of Japanese can be classified into four main categories:Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

words that mimic sounds made by living things, like a dog's bark (wan-wan).

words that mimic sounds made by inanimate objects, like wind blowing or rain falling (zā-zā).

words that depict states, conditions, or manners of the external world (non-auditory senses), such as "damp" or "stealthily".

words that depict psychological states or bodily feelings.

These divisions are not always drawn: sound-symbolism may be referred to generally as onomatopoeia (though strictly this refers to imitative sounds, phonomimes); phonomimes may not be distinguished as animate/inanimate, both being referred to as giseigo; and both phenomimes and psychomimes may be referred to as gitaigo.

In Japanese grammar, sound-symbolic words primarily function as adverbs, though they can also function as verbs (verbal adverbs) with the auxiliary verb , often in the continuous/progressive form , and as adjectives (participle) with the perfective form of this verb . Just like ideophones in many other languages, they are often introduced by a quotative complementizer .Template:Sfn Most sound symbolic words can be applied to only a handful of verbs or adjectives. In the examples below, the classified verb or adjective is placed in square brackets.

Some examples

Sound Symbolism	Meaning
jirojiro (to) [miru]	[see] intently (= stare)
kirakira (to) [hikaru]	[shine] sparklingly
giragira (to) [hikaru]	[shine] dazzlingly
doki doki [suru]Template:Efn	with a throbbing heart
guzu guzu [suru]	procrastinating or dawdling (suru not optional)
shiin to [suru]	[be (lit. do)] quiet (suru not optional)
pinpin [shite iru]	[be (lit. do)] lively (shite iru not optional)
yoboyobo ni [naru]Template:Efn	[become] wobbly-legged (from age)

Other types

In their Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar, Seiichi Makino and Michio Tsutsui point out several other types of sound symbolism in Japanese, that relate phonemes and psychological states. For example, the nasal sound gives a more personal and speaker-oriented impression than the velars and ; this contrast can be easily noticed in pairs of synonyms such as and which both mean because, but with the first being perceived as more subjective. This relationship can be correlated with phenomimes containing nasal and velar sounds: While phenomimes containing nasals give the feeling of tactuality and warmth, those containing velars tend to represent hardness, sharpness, and suddenness.

Similarly, i-type adjectives that contain the fricative Template:IPAblink in the group shi tend to represent human emotive states, such as in the words , , , and . This too is correlated with those phenomimes and psychomimes containing the same fricative sound, for example and .

The use of the gemination can create a more emphatic or emotive version of a word, as in the following pairs of words: , , , and many others.

See also

• Chinese exclamative particles
• Kuchi shōga (system for "pronouncing" drum sounds)
• Onomatopoeia
• Sound symbolism

Sources

• Template:Cite thesis
• Akutsu, Satoru (1994). A Practical Guide to Mimetic Expressions Through Pictures. ALC Press, Template:ISBN.
• Hasada, Rie (2001). "Meanings of Japanese sound-symbolic emotion words". In Harkins, Jean & Anna Wierzbicka (eds.) Emotions in Crosslinguistic Perspective (Cognitive Linguistics Research 17). Berlin, New York: Mouton de Gruyter, pp. 217–253.
• Martin, Samuel E. (1964). "Speech labels in Japan and Korea", in Dell Hymes (ed.), Language in Culture and Society: A reader in linguistics and anthropology. New York: Harper and Row.
• Ono, Shuuichi (ed.) (1989). A Practical Guide to Japanese-English Onomatopoeia and Mimesis. Tokyo: Hokuseidoo.
• Seiichi Makino and Michio Tsutsui, Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar, The Japan Times, 1986. Template:ISBN.
• (esp p. 153vv).

Further reading

• De Lange, William (2019). A Dictionary of Japanese Onomatopoeia. TOYO Press. Template:ISBN.

External links

• Onomatopoeic Expressions - gitaigo and giongo Template:Webarchive from Namiko Abe, About.com's guide to Japanese Language
• Nihongoresources - onomatopoeia dictionary
• The Jaded Network - SFX Sound Effects Translations Online Dictionary from TheJadedNetwork.Com
• "'Tokyo Year Zero' Gets Under Readers' Skin" by Alan Cheuse, All Things Considered. A review of a novel that uses Japanese phonomime.
• Japanese Sound effects in Manga and what they mean, originally from www.oop-ack.com (archived copy of the original)
• Shoko Hamano's doctoral thesis, in its entirety.