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  • Publisher:
    Cambridge University Press
    Publication date:
    18 December 2025
    13 November 2025
    ISBN:
    9781009438001
    9781009438018
    DOI:
    https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009438001
    Dimensions:
    (229 x 152 mm)
    Weight & Pages:
    0.787kg, 420 Pages
    Dimensions:
    Weight & Pages:
    • Subjects:
    Phonetics and Phonology, Language and Linguistics, Semantics and Pragmatics
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    Subjects:
    Phonetics and Phonology, Language and Linguistics, Semantics and Pragmatics
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    Book description

    How do languages capture and represent the sounds of the world? Is this a universal phenomenon? Drawing from data taken from 124 different languages, this innovative book offers a detailed exploration of onomatopoeia, that are imagic icons of sound events. It provides comprehensive analysis from both theoretical and empirical perspectives, and identifies the prototypical semiotic, phonological, morphological, syntactic, word-formation, and socio-pragmatic features of onomatopoeia. Supported with numerous examples from the sample languages, the book highlights the varied scope of onomatopoeia in different languages, its relationship to ideophones and interjections, and the role of sound symbolism, particularly phonesthemes, in onomatopoeia-formation. It introduces an onomasiological model of onomatopoeia-formation, identifies onomatopoeic patterns, and specifies the factors affecting the similarities and differences between onomatopoeias standing for the same sound event. Filling a major gap in language studies, it is essential reading for researchers and students of phonology, morphology, semiotics, poetics, and linguistic typology.

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