phonaesthesia
nounEtymology Apparently coined by British linguist John Rupert Firth. From phon- + -aesthesia.
1
Human sciences, Linguistics, Sciences Any correspondence between the sound of a word and its meaning; examples include onomatopoeia and the use of phonesthemes.
- For this latter term, phonaesthesia is doubtless at work, since kring is also ‘the sound of a small bell’.1984, Laurence Picken, Musica Asiatica, volume 4, page 214:
- In contrast, writers of bucolic dialogues, like George Meriton, for instance, and lively song-writers like Robert Anderson in Cumberland, seem drawn to expressive lexis, marked by sound patterns of reduplication, alliteration and phonaesthesia.2010, Katie Wales, “Northern English in Writing”, in Raymond Hickey, editor, Varieties of English in Writing: The written word as linguistic evidence, page 74:
2 more examples
- Phonaesthesia refers to the vaguer phenomenon whereby families of words with shared phonemes sometimes evoke related meanings in a not-quite-echoic manner.2011, Prue Goodwin, The Literate Classroom, page 41:
- Those in (1.15) illustrate a weaker type of iconicity, generally known as phonaesthesia: the consonant cluster ‘fl’ seems to suggest quick movement, but it is not a direct representation of movement, or speed.2011, Jean Boase-Beier, A Critical Introduction to Translation Studies, page 11:
- Synonyms
- sound symbolism
- Derived terms
- phonaesthetic, phonaesthetics
- Related terms
- ideophone, phonaestheme
- Hypernyms
- synaesthesia