All these words are somehow related to light, and all start with a “gl-”

‘The woman thammed her way through the slonging crowd, yilking at each elbow that swubbed her, and glathing fiercely at anyone who dared prevent her flisking off home’

I made up all six of those italicized words—that’s what a degree in Linguistics will teach you—but you, being the sharp reader that you are, probably got the gist of what I meant by them. First of all, our loyal inflectional friends –ing and –ed make understanding the above sentence much easier, you know right away that my neologisms must be actions. That being said, you still probably have an idea what sort of actions I was attempting to convey.

How is this possible? Did I really make up those words? (Yes). Are you a genius, dear reader? (Keep guessing). Do we, as language users, have an inherent capability to decipher unknown words and attach meanings to them? (Not quite).

If you look closely, all the fake words I used above actually have a little slice of meaning imbedded in them. There should be something familiar about these words despite their falsehood, like examining your reflection after plastic surgery. Why? Because of PHONESTHEMES (funny that most people are unable to ‘get the gist’ of this word just by looking at it—oh the irony).

But what are these creatures?

Telephones with themes, duh.

No, more like SOUNDS with THEMES[1].

Phonesthemes are essentially pieces of a word (or affix) that carry some sort of semantic connotation[2], like a fluid motion, an abrupt motion, a gradual change, a hushed sound, a piercing sound, a constant sound, a heavy physical movement etc. The list goes on.

Some languages use phonesthemes very productively. Most notably, Japanese, in which there are many action and (action) description words that involve phonesthemes. The origins of phonesthemes is much debated in Linguistics. Some claim that phonesthemes derive from onomatopoeic utterances: the speaker is using their mouth to imitate the world around them (e.g. producing sounds whilst rounding your lips to describe round objects or circular actions).[3]

Let’s look at the phonesthemes I used earlier. I will give my general interpretation of the fake word and you can compare it with your own understanding to see if it matches up.

Thammed, Phonestheme: th- A fluid but heavy physical motion. See: thump, thrash, throttle, thrall, thrust, thwack, thwap, My interpretation: to push forcibly through or on something Note: ‘-ammed’ could add ‘rammed’ or ‘slammed’ connotations

Slonging, Phonestheme: slo- A lackadaisical movement (possibly negative)[4] See: slow, slosh, slope, slop, slog, (and possibly by extension: slob, slovenly, or SLUT…maybe) My interpretation: to be churning or moving about randomly Note: ‘-onged’ could add connotations of a ‘throng’

Yilking, Phonestheme: y + VOWEL A piercing, screeching sound, not constant, but repetitive See: yip, yap, yikes, yell, yowl, yeek My interpretation: to cry out sharply (from pain or surprise)

Swubbed, Phonestheme: sw- A (quick and) fluid motion See: swipe, swing, swim, sweep, switch, swell, swift (and possibly by extension: swindle, swop) My interpretation: to jab or push aggressively Notes: ‘-ubbed’ could add connotations of ‘clubbed’ and ‘rubbed’ (also the title of my favourite adult film)

Glathing, Phonestheme: gl- Having to do with sight or luminance See: glare, glimpse, glance, gloat, glean, glower, glitter, glow, glisten (and by extension: glamour, glory) My interpretation: to look with loathing

Flisking, Phonestheme: fl- A passing movement See: flow, flutter, flee, flit, flap, flip, flop, flash, flicker My interpretation: to escape quickly Note: ‘-isk’ could add connotations of ‘whisk’

You get the picture.

It should be noted that the endings of words may have phonesthemic properties. Such words with similar endings may share characteristics. Slap, slip, drip, clip, and thwap—can be interpreted as having swift or sharp endings, and it could be argued that the bilabial stop sound [p] may convey this.

Like with everything in Linguistics, there are always exceptions. Except for universals—see, yet another exception. Phonesthemes do not apply for all words in English. As you know, the -gl- in the word ‘English’ certainly has nothing to do with ‘sight or luminance’. And phonesthemes are not at all regular (glue, gloop, gloom--sight? luminance? I think snot). This may be due to language evolution, adaptation of loanwords, and/or other historical reasons. But they do account for two important things: marketing (think: brand names) and your interpretation of Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll and anything ever written by Dr Seuss.

Further Information:

Hinton, L., Nichols, J., and Ohala, J. (1994). Sound Symbolism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Linguist List 9.1106

  [1] Greek for ‘sound’ + ‘perception’.

[2] I use ‘connotation’ here because I think ‘meaning’ would be too definite. Most phonesthemes have very broad interpretations that fall under an umbrella of meanings.

[3] Others might claim that phonesthemes gain their connotations from other words (cf. loanwords), but, this would have to be a language-specific process and not a universal for all languages. Also, both the borrowing process and the onomatopoeic processes could happen in one language. Borrowing would be something like English adopting the FL- phonestheme from the pre-existing word FLatulance. However, the general assumption is that the onomatopoeic form always comes first (historically).