Wise Wednesday Grammar: Onomatopoeia

Figure of speech.

SCHEMES.

Onomatopoeia

An onomatopoeia (sometimes written as onomatopœia), from the Greek ὀνοματοποιία; ὄνομα for "name" and ποιέω for "I make", adjectival form: "onomatopoeic" or "onomatopoetic") is a word that phonetically imitates or suggests the source of the sound that it describes. Onomatopoeia (as an uncountable noun) refers to the property of such words. Common occurrences of onomatopoeias include animal noises such as "oink", "meow", "roar" or "chirp". Onomatopoeias are not the same across all languages; they conform to some extent to the broader linguistic system they are part of; hence the sound of a clock may be tick tock in English, dī dā in Mandarin, or katchin katchin in Japanese.

Although in the English language the term onomatopoeia means the imitation of a sound, in the Greek language the compound word onomatopoeia (ονοματοποιία) means "making or creating names". For words that imitate sounds the term Ηχομιμητικό (echomimetico or echomimetic) is used. Ηχομιμητικό (echomimetico) from Ηχώ meaning "echo or sound" and μιμητικό meaning "mimetic or imitation".

Uses of onomatopoeia

In the case of a frog croaking, the spelling may vary because different frog species around the world make different sounds: Ancient Greek brekekekex koax koax (only in Aristophanes' comic play The Frogs) for probably marsh frogs; English ribbit for species of frog found in North America; English verb "croak" for the common frog.

Some other very common English-language examples include hiccup, zoom, bang, beep, moo, and splash. Machines and their sounds are also often described with onomatopoeia, as in honk or beep-beep for the horn of an automobile, and vroom or brum for the engine. When someone speaks of a mishap involving an audible arcing of electricity, the word "zap" is often used (and has subsequently been expanded and used to describe non-auditory effects generally connoting the same sort of localized but thorough interference or destruction similar to that produced in short-circuit sparking).

For animal sounds, words like quack (duck), moo (cow), bark or woof (dog), roar (lion), meow/miaow or purr (cat), cluck) (chicken) and baa(sheep) are typically used in English. Some of these words are used both as nouns and as verbs.

Some languages flexibly integrate onomatopoeic words into their structure. This may evolve into a new word, up to the point that it is no longer recognized as onomatopoeia. One example is English "bleat" for the sheep noise: in medieval times it was pronounced approximately as "blairt" (but without an R-component), or "blet" with the vowel drawled, which is much more accurate as onomatopoeia than the modern pronunciation.

An example of the opposite case is "cuckoo", which, due to continuous familiarity with the bird noise down the centuries, has kept approximately the same pronunciation as in Anglo-Saxon times and its vowels have not changed as they have in the word "furrow".

Verba dicendi are a method of integrating onomatopoeia and ideophones into grammar.

Sometimes things are named from the sounds they make. In English, for example, there is the universal fastener which is named for the onomatopoeic of the sound it makes: the zip (in the UK) or zipper (in the U.S.). Many birds are named after their calls, such as the Bobwhite quail, the Weero, the Morepork, the killdeer, chickadee, the cuckoo, the chiffchaff, the whooping crane and the whip-poor-will. In Tamil and Malayalam, the word for crow is kaakaa. This practice is especially common in certain languages such as Māori and, therefore, in names of animals borrowed from these languages.

Cross-culture differences

Although a particular sound is heard similarly by people of different cultures, it is often expressed through the use of different consonant strings in different languages. For example, the "snip" of a pair of scissors is su-su in Chinese, cri-cri in Italian, riqui-riqui in Spanish, terre-terre in Portuguese, krits-krits in modern Greek and katr-katr in Hindi. Similarly, the "honk" of a car's horn is ba-ba in Chinese, tut-tut in French, pu-pu in Japanese, bbang-bbang in Korean, baert-baert in Norwegian and bim-bim in Vietnamese.

Onomatopoeic effect without onomatopoeia words

Onomatopoeic effect can also be produced in a phrase or word string with the help of alliteration and consonance alone, without using any onomatopoeic words. The most famous example is the phrase "furrow followed free" in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner. It may be noted that the words "followed" and "free" are not onomatopoeic in themselves, but in conjunction with "forrow", they reproduce the sound of ripples following in the wake of a speeding ship. Similarly, alliteration has been used in the line "as the surf surged up the sun swept shore...", to recreate the sound of breaking waves, in the poem "I, She and the Sea". In the poem Kalahandi by Dr Tapan Kumar Pradhan, the rhythm of the word string "smell of hooch, of sweat, of flesh, the man's..." evokes the sounds produced during an act of aggressive sexual intercourse without the use of onomatopoeia or alliteration.

Comics and advertising

Comic strips and comic books made extensive use of onomatopoeia. Popular culture historian Tim DeForest noted the impact of writer-artist Roy Crane (1901–1977), the creator of Captain Easy and Buz Sawyer:

It was Crane who pioneered the use of onomatopoeic sound effects in comics, adding "bam," "pow" and "wham" to what had previously been an almost entirely visual vocabulary. Crane had fun with this, tossing in an occasional "ker-splash" or "lickety-wop" along with what would become the more standard effects. Words, as well as images, became vehicles for carrying along his increasingly fast-paced story lines.

In 2002, DC Comics introduced a villain named Onomatopoeia, an athlete, martial artist and weapons expert who often speaks sounds.

Advertising uses onomatopoeia as a mnemonic, so consumers will remember their products, as in Alka-Seltzer's "Plop, plop, fizz, fizz. Oh, what a relief it is!" jingle, recorded in two different versions (big band and rock) by Sammy Davis, Jr.

Rice Krispies (US and UK) and Rice Bubbles (AU) make a "snap, crackle, pop" when one pours on milk. During the 1930s, the illustrator Vernon Grant developed Snap, Crackle and Pop as gnome-like mascots for the Kellogg Company.

Sounds surface in road safety advertisements: "clunk click, every trip" (click the seatbelt on after clunking the car door closed; UK campaign) or "click, clack, front and back" (click, clack of connecting the seatbelts; AU campaign) or "click it or ticket" (click of the connecting seatbelt; US DOT campaign).

Manner imitation

In many of the world's languages, onomatopoeia-like words are used to describe phenomena apart from the purely auditive. Japanese often utilizes such words to describe feelings or figurative expressions about objects or concepts. For instance, Japanese barabara is used to reflect an object's state of disarray or separation, and shiiin is the onomatopoetic form of absolute silence (used at the time an English speaker might expect to hear the sound of crickets chirping or a pin dropping in a silent room, or someone coughing). It is used in English as well with terms like bling, which describes the glinting of light on things like gold, chrome or precious stones. In Japanese, kirakira is used for glittery things.

Examples in Media

• Whaam! (1963) by Roy Lichtenstein is an early example of pop art, featuring a reproduction of comic book art that depicts a fighter aircraft striking another with rockets with dazzling red and yellow explosions (For more information about pop art, click here). 
• Marvel Comics has trademarked two words of their own invention: thwip!, the sound of Spider-Man's web shooter, and snikt! the switchblade-sound of Wolverine's claws coming out of his hands.
• In the Garfield comic strip and television series, there is a running gag about a "splut," which is usually the sound of a pie hitting someone in the face.
• In the 1960s TV series Batman, comic book style onomatopoeias such as wham!, pow!, "biff!", crunch and "zounds" appear onscreen during fight scenes. This is often the subject of parody, for example in the Simpsons episode "Radioactive Man" where the onomatopoeic words are replaced with snuh!, newt! and mint! which are references to other Simpsons episodes.
• Ubisoft's XIII employed the use of comic book onomatopoeias such as bam!, boom and noooo! during gameplay for gunshots, explosions and kills, respectively. The comic-book style is apparent throughout the game and is a core theme, and the game is an adaptation of a comic book of the same name.
• In book 4 of Jonathan Swift's novel Gulliver's Travels, the name of the Houyhnhnms is an onomatopoeia for the whinny of a horse.
• The chorus of American popular song writer John Prine's song "Onomatopoeia" cleverly incorporates onomatopoeic words (though as discussed, 'ouch!' is not the sound of pain): "Bang! went the pistol. | Crash! went the window. | Ouch! went the son of a gun. | Onomatopoeia | I don't wanna see ya | Speaking in a foreign tongue."
• A well-known rhetorical question is "Why doesn't onomatopoeia sound like what it is?". Iain M. Banks references this in his novelAgainst a Dark Background, when a character claims that the word onomatopoeia is spelled "just the way it sounds!".
• The marble game KerPlunk is an onomatopoeia for the sound of the marbles dropping when one too many sticks has been removed.
• The Nickelodeon cartoon Kablam is implied to be onomotapoeic to a crash.
• In a 2002 episode of The West Wing, Rob Lowe (Sam Seaborn) and Ian McShane (portraying a Russian negotiator) have a conversation about how the word 'frumpy' "onomatopoetically sounds right".
• Each episode of the TV series Harper's Island was given an onomatopoeic name which imitates the sound made in that episode when a character dies. For example, in the episode titled "Bang" a character is shot and fatally wounded, with the "Bang" mimicking the sound of the gunshot.
• In The Transformers, the Autobot Warpath spoke with onomatopoeia in his speech, which included "Wham", "Bang", "Blam", "Whack", "Woosh", "Bam", "Zoom", "Zap", "Boom", "Wow", "Clang", "Pow", and "Boing" among others.

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Wise Wednesday Grammar: Merism

Figure of speech.

SCHEMES.

Merism

In law, a merism is a figure of speech by which a single thing is referred to by a conventional phrase that enumerates several of its parts, orwhich lists several synonyms for the same thing.

In rhetoric a merism is the combination of two contrasting words, to refer to an entirety. For example, when we mean to say that someone searched thoroughly, everywhere, we often say that someone "searched high and low". You also say "ladies and gentlemen" and the "'young and old"'.

Merisms also figure in a number of familiar English expressions. The phrase lock, stock, and barrel originally referred to the parts of a gun, by counting off several of its more conspicuous parts; it has come to refer to the whole of anything that has constituent parts. Basically, {phrase} and everything in between - all encompassing.

In biology, a merism is a repetition of similar parts in the structure of an organism (Bateson 1894). Such features are called meristic characters, and the study of such characters is called meristics.

Merisms are conspicuous features of Biblical poetry. For example, in Genesis 1:1, when God creates "the heavens and the earth" (KJV), the two parts combine to indicate that God created the whole universe. Similarly, in Psalm 139, the psalmist declares that God knows "my downsitting and mine uprising", indicating that God knows all the psalmist's actions.

Legal usage

Merisms frequently figure in the writing of lawyers, and are a hallmark of legal style. The two parts of the legal merism "Last Will and Testament" at one time referred to two documents, enforced in two separate courts: the will disposed of a decedent's real property while the testament disposed of chattels. It became customary to combine the instruments in a single dispositive document, and the name has continued long after the doctrines that required its use became obsolete in common law.

A lawyer who writes a will typically includes a residuary clause that disposes of any property not covered by a prior section. The weight of tradition is such that the lawyer writing such a document will often phrase it something like this:

I bequeath, convey, and devise the rest, residue, and remainder of my property, whether real or personal, and wheresoever it may be situated, to...

Traditionally, a gift of real property was called a "devise" whereas a gift of other property was a "bequest". Nowadays, the words "bequeath" and "devise" are synonymous in most jurisdictions so that "I bequeath the rest of my property to ..." is enough in both law and logic to achieve the same result. The entire phrase is an elaborate merism. Many deeds frequently contain a traditional clause that says that the grantee is "to have and to hold" the property conveyed; this usage goes back to the days in which the instruments were drawn up in Latin, and is sometimes called a "habendam et tenendam" clause. The use of legal merisms seldom if ever adds legal effect to the document that contains them, and frequently increases their reading difficulty. However, the weight of tradition and the fear that a deviation from the established formula might have unintended legal consequences makes lawyers reluctant to revise the traditional formulae, and their clients, seeing them, at least draw the satisfaction of knowing that their documents appear to be written by a lawyer.

Some merisms were introduced during the period when Norman French words were being absorbed into English. In order to assure that a document was clear to both Normans and Saxons, it was desirable to use both the Saxon-root and French-root synonyms for important words, to avoid a pretext for someone to claim a misunderstanding.

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Wise Wednesday Grammar: Internal rhyme

Figure of speech.

SCHEMES.

Internal rhyme

In poetry, internal rhyme, or middle rhyme, is rhyme that occurs within a single line of verse.

Examples:

Internal rhyme schemes were extremely common in popular song of the Swing Era. One familiar example is the bridge from "Don't Fence Me In," written by Cole Porter for the film "Hollywood Canteen" in 1944:

Just turn me loose let me straddle my old saddle,
Underneath the western skies,
On my cayuse let me wander over yonder,
'Til I see the mountains rise.

Internal rhyme is used extensively in rap/hip hop music. The usage of internal rhyme in rap has increased over time, but can be found even in the earliest rap songs, such as the Sugarhill Gang's 1979 single, Rapper's Delight:

I'm six-foot-one and I'm tons of fun and I dress to a T
You see, I got more clothes than Muhammad Ali and I dress so viciously
I got body guards, I got two big cars, I definitely ain't the whack
I got a Lincoln Continental and a sun-roofed Cadillac
So after school, I take a dip in the pool, which is really on the wall
I got a color TV, so I can see the Knicks play basketball

Internal rhyme is used frequently by many different hip hop artists, including Kool Moe Dee, Big Daddy Kane, and Rakim, as demonstrated inEric B. and Rakim's 1987 piece, "My Melody" from their debut album Paid In Full:

My unusual style will confuse you a while
If I were water, I'd flow in the Nile
So many rhymes you won't have time to go for yours
Just because of applause I have to pause
Right after tonight is when I prepare
To catch another sucker-duck MC out there
My strategy has to be tragedy, catastrophe
And after this you'll call me your majesty...

Another prominent hip hop artist who uses internal rhymes is AZ, as shown in "The Format":

1 Young and gifted, my tongue's prolific
2 In the beach bungalow is how I brung in Christmas
3 To the streets imma flow from the hungriest districts
4 Swiss kicks crisp when I come to them picnics
5 Play slow, paper chase stack and lay low
6 Range rove tinted all black the same old
7 Psychic mind, righteous rhymes that turned a new leaf from a life of crime
8 No concerns with new beef, who's as nice as I'm
9 It's confirmed, from few feet I'm still a sniper blind
10 Built my fame, spilt my pain
11 Politicking daily, still trying to milk the game
12 It's obvious that I'm real, rap skills remain
13 I took some change and I'm still the same

It is important to note the complexity of the internal rhyme patterns as the verse progresses. Starting with simple compounds, line-for-line: "Young and Gifted", "tongue's prolific"; the artist blends in another AB multi: "beach bungalow", "streets imma flow" while capping the line with the original AB pattern: "hungriest districts".

Rhyme table: Simple AB Multi

sound / line #	built (10)	fame (10)
10	spilt	pain
11	milk	game
12	skills	main (remain)
13	still	same

Rhyme table: Nested AB Multi

sound / line #	young (1)	gifted (1)	beach (2)	bungalow (2)
1	tongue	lific (prolific)	--	--
2	brung	christmas	--	--
3	hung (hungriest)	districts	streets	flow
4	--	swiss kicks, picnics	--	--

Rhyme table: Full Line Multi

sound / line #	play (5)	slow (5)	stack (5)	lay (5)	low (5)
6	range	rov	black	same	old

AZ then adds to the depth of his internal rhymes, nearly rhyming word-for-word, one entire line to another:

Rhyme table: Lines 7-9

sound / line #	turned (7)	new (7)	leaf (7)	life (7)	crime (7)
8	concerns	new	beef	nice	I'm
9	confirmed	few	feet	snipe (sniper)	blind

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Wise Wednesday Grammar: Isocolon

Figure of speech.

SCHEMES.

Isocolon

Isocolon is a figure of speech in which parallelism is reinforced by members that are of the same length. A well-known example of this isJulius Caesar's "Veni, vidi, vici" ("I came; I saw; I conquered), which also illustrates that a common form of isocolon is tricolon, or the use of three parallel members.

It is derived from the Greek ἴσος (ísos), "equal" and κῶλον (kôlon), "member, clause".

Examples

• "They have suffered severely, but they have fought well", Winston Churchill, Speech to the House of Commons, June 18, 1940. 
• "Let each man search his conscience and search his speeches." Winston Churchill Speech to the House of Commons, June 18, 1940. 
• "I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse", Charles V. 
• "Many will enter. Few will win", Nabisco. 
• "No ifs, ands, or buts", English Proverb. 
• "With mirth in funeral, and with dirge in marriage", Claudius, Act 1 Scene 2 of Hamlet. 
• "Many are called, but few are chosen", Biblical Proverb Matthew 22:14

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Wise Wednesday Grammar: Hyperbole

Figure of speech.

SCHEMES.

Hyperbole

Hyperbole (/haɪˈpɜrbəliː/ hy-pur-bə-lee; Greek: ὑπερβολή hyperbolē, "exaggeration") is the use of exaggeration as a rhetorical device or figure of speech. It may be used to evoke strong feelings or to create a strong impression, but is not meant to be taken literally.

Hyperboles are exaggerations to create emphasis or effect. As a literary device, hyperbole is often used in poetry, and is frequently encountered in casual speech. An example of hyperbole is: "The bag weighed a ton." Hyperbole makes the point that the bag was very heavy, though it probably does not weigh a ton.

In rhetoric, some opposites of hyperbole are meiosis, litotes, understatement, and bathos (the 'letdown' after a hyperbole in a phrase).

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Wise Wednesday Grammar: Homonym

Figure of speech.

SCHEMES.

Homonym

In linguistics, a homonym is, in the strict sense, one of a group of words that share the same spelling and the same pronunciation but have different meanings. Thus homonyms are simultaneously homographs (words that share the same spelling, regardless of their pronunciation) and homophones (words that share the same pronunciation, regardless of their spelling). The state of being a homonym is called homonymy. Examples of homonyms are the pair stalk (part of a plant) and stalk(follow/harass a person) and the pair left (past tense of leave) and left (opposite of right). A distinction is sometimes made between "true" homonyms, which are unrelated in origin, such as skate (glide on ice) and skate (the fish), and polysemous homonyms, or polysemes, which have a shared origin, such as mouth (of a river) and mouth (of an animal).

In non-technical contexts, the term "homonym" may be used (somewhat confusingly) to refer to words that are either homographs or homophones. In this looser sense, the word row (propel with oars) and row (argument) are considered homonyms, as are the words read (peruse) and reed (waterside plant).

Etymology

The word homonym comes from the Greek ὁμώνυμος (homonumos), meaning "having the same name", which is the conjunction of ὁμός (homos), "common, same"and ὄνομα (onoma) meaning "name". Thus, it refers to two or more distinct concepts sharing the "same name" or signifier. 

Note: for the h sound, see rough breathing and smooth breathing.

Related Terms

Several similar linguistic concepts are related to homonymy. These include:

• Homographs (literally "same writing") are usually defined as words that share the same spelling, regardless of how they are pronounced. If they are pronounced the same then they are also homophones (and homonyms) – for example, bark (the sound of a dog) and bark (the skin of a tree). If they are pronounced differently then they are also heteronyms – for example, bow (the front of a ship) and bow (a ranged weapon).

• Homophones (literally "same sound") are usually defined as words that share the same pronunciation, regardless of how they are spelled. If they are spelled the same then they are also homographs (and homonyms); if they are spelled differently then they are also heterographs(literally "different writing"). Homographic examples include rose (flower) and rose (past tense ofrise). Heterographic examples include to, too, two, and there, their, they’re.

• Heteronyms (literally "different name") are the subset of homographs (words that share the same spelling) that have different pronunciations (and meanings). Such words include desert (to abandon) and desert (arid region); row (to argue or an argument) and row (as in to row a boat or a row of seats - a pair of homophones). Heteronyms are also sometimes called heterophones (literally "different sound").

• Polysemes are words with the same spelling and distinct but related meanings. The distinction between polysemy and homonymy is often subtle and subjective, and not all sources consider polysemous words to be homonyms. Words such as mouth, meaning either the orifice on one's face, or the opening of a cave or river, are polysemous and may or may not be considered homonyms.

• Capitonyms are words that share the same spelling but have different meanings when capitalized (and may or may not have different pronunciations). Such words include polish (to make shiny) and Polish (from Poland);march (organized, uniformed, steady and rhythmic walking forward) and March (the third month of the year in the Gregorian Calendar). However, both polish or march at the beginning of sentences still need to be capitalised.

Term	Meaning	Spelling	Pronunciation
Homonym	Different	Same	Same
Homograph	Different	Same	Same or different
Homophone	Different	Same or different	Same
Heteronym	Different	Same	Different
Heterograph	Different	Different	Same
Polyseme	Different but related	Same	Same or different
Capitonym	Different when capitalized	Same except for capitalization	Same or different
Synonym	Same	Different	Different

Further Examples

A further example of a homonym, which is both a homophone and a homograph, is fluke. Fluke can mean:

• A fish, and a flatworm.
• The end parts of an anchor.
• The fins on a whale's tail.
• A stroke of luck.

All four are separate lexemes with separate etymologies, but share the one form, fluke.

Similarly, a river bank, a savings bank, a bank of switches, and a bank shot in pool share a common spelling and pronunciation, but differ in meaning.

The words bow and bough are examples where there are two meanings associated with a single pronunciation and spelling (the weapon and the knot); two meanings with two different pronunciations (the knot and the act of bending at the waist), and two distinct meanings sharing the same sound but different spellings (bow, the act of bending at the waist, and bough, the branch of a tree). In addition, it has several related but distinct meanings – a bent line is sometimes called a 'bowed' line, reflecting its similarity to the weapon. Even according to the most restrictive definitions, various pairs of sounds and meanings of bow, Bow and bough are homonyms, homographs, homophones, heterophones, heterographs, capitonyms and are polysemous.

• bow – a long wooden stick with horse hair that is used to play certain string instruments such as the violin
• bow – to bend forward at the waist in respect (e.g. "bow down")
• bow – the front of the ship (e.g. "bow and stern")
• bow – a kind of tied ribbon (e.g. bow on a present, a bowtie)
• bow – to bend outward at the sides (e.g. a "bow-legged" cowboy)
• Bow – a district in London
• bow -- a weapon to shoot projectiles with (e.g. a bow and arrow)
• bough – a branch on a tree. (e.g. "when the bough breaks...")

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