Definition of onomatopoeia - What it is, Meaning and Concept

Onomatopoeia is a word that comes from the late Latin onomatopoeia , although its origin dates back to a Greek word.It is the imitation or recreation of sound of something in the term that is used to mean it .It can also refer to visual phenomena .

For example: “Your vehicle was moving in a zigzag way to that crashed into a tree ”.In this case, the onomatopoeia “ zigzag ” refers to an oscillating walk that is perceived with the sense of sight.

The word click , also accepted in Spanish written without the letter "k", is another example of onomatopoeia, and its use is very common today. click that is heard when you press the mouse button (or mouse) has become a word that allows you to refer to that action.

Onomatopoeias are also words or expressions that mimic the sound they make animals , and these are used by young children of many and very diverse cultures, although they are also very common in the literature.

"Wow" (dog), "meow" (cat), "pio" (bird), "cuac " (duck), " kikiriki " (rooster), " muu " (cow) and " oink " (pig) They are some of the most popular onomatopoeias.It is interesting to note that each language has its own onomatopoeia and many times the differences are considerable, despite the fact that these terms arise from the imitation of the same sounds.

"Wow" , "pio" and "kikiriki" of Spanish become "woof" , "tweet" and "cock-a-doodle-doo" in the English language.

Japanese is probably the language with the highest number of onomatopoeias.This language includes onomatopoeia in everyday speech, something that is not very common in other countries of the world.

Linguistic diversity and the creation of onomatopoeia

The differences between the onomatopoeia of each language are a topic that does not interest many people, since they are mainly noticed by those studying a foreign language, but hide a phenomenon worthy of being discussed in depth.

First of all, it is important to note that not all languages ​​have the same sounds.For example, our pronunciation of the letter "r" is very different from the one you receive in English or Japanese; In the latter case, the distance is even greater, since other alphabet is used in Japan and does not have a specific character for the "r", but they combine it with a series of vowels, also different from ours.

Having accepted and understood the sound diversity that exists in the world, it is understandable that not all of us have been able to represent the sounds of nature in the same way, but this leads us to ask ourselves something that, perhaps, also goes unnoticed: Is our hearing capacity limited by the characteristics of our language? That is, does an Irish hear the same as a Spanish? The answer, again, requires a certain theoretical background.

Our brain has the ability (and perhaps the need) to fill in the blanks with information generated by it; In other words, it could be understood as a function that tries to make us feel at ease, even if we don't know what is happening around us.If we hear for a few minutes a conversation in a language we don't understand, we are likely to begin to perceive certain words in our tongue, or even some onomatopoeia; The brain wants to understand.

For this reason, if a person who cannot pronounce the syllable "cro" hears the croaking of a frog, he is expected not to perceive it as a Spanish-speaking person either.His brain will seek the closest option, making use of the sounds available in the language or languages ​​you know, and this will be convincing for the individual.

In summary, our first linguistic structure arms us with tools to understand and communicate what we see, hear and feel, but what makes sense in our mind, can be absurd or non-existent in others.