Sound-Symbolic Iconicity and Grammar
Janis B. Nuckolls · 1996
Abstract Part I laid the conceptual foundations for understanding the interconnections between sound symbolism, aspect, and performance. Sound-symbolic utterances exploit the embodied properties and constraints of language. The linguistic sign vehicle is intrinsically durative because it consists of a spoken chain of significant differences. It is also intrinsically completive because of the limitations of the human breath which must spend itself at regular intervals of articulation. These given features of linguistic communication are then enhanced through performative movements of the mouth, shapings of the vocal tract, and fluctuations in voice pitch, all of which imitate movements and processes of perceptual experience.