Many languages of the world have phonaesthetic, sound-symbolic words
that express shapes, colors, smells, motions, sounds, or emotions.
These words are variably described
as "ideophones," "expressives," "mimetics," "echo-words", etc.
Although English is not usually viewed as a language that is rich in
phonosemantic words, we do have our share of such items as wishy-
washy, flim-flam, and mumbo-jumbo.

In this seminar, we will look at sound symbolism from descriptive
(i.e., language specific) and comparative (both areal and universal)
perspectives. Students will be expected to participate actively in
seminar discussions and to write original term papers on topics of
their choosing. The seminar should appeal to students in anthropology
and folklore as well as to students in linguistics.

There will be no textbook as such, but we will read chapters from the
following two books (both of which will be on reserve):

Hinton, Leanne, Johanna Nichols, and John Ohala (eds.), Sound
Symbolism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (1994).

Voeltz, F. K. Erhard and Christa Killian-Hatz (eds.), Ideophones.
(Typological studies in Language, 44.) Amsterdam: John Benjamins
(2001).