Editing Onomatopoeia (section)

== In linguistics ==
A key component of language is its arbitrariness and what a word can represent,{{clarify|date=May 2017}} as a word is a sound created by humans with attached meaning to said sound.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Assaneo |first1=María Florencia |last2=Nichols |first2=Juan Ignacio |last3=Trevisan |first3=Marcos Alberto |date=January 1, 2011 |title=The anatomy of onomatopoeia |journal=PLOS ONE |volume=6 |issue=12 |pages=e28317 |doi=10.1371/journal.pone.0028317 |issn=1932-6203 |pmc=3237459 |pmid=22194825|bibcode=2011PLoSO...628317A |doi-access=free }}</ref> It is not possible to determine the meaning of a word purely by how it sounds. However, in onomatopoeic words, these sounds are much less arbitrary; they are connected in their imitation of other objects or sounds in nature. Vocal sounds in the imitation of natural sounds does not necessarily gain meaning, but can gain symbolic meaning.{{clarify|date=May 2017}}<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |last=RHODES |first=R |date=1994 |title=Aural Images |journal=In J. Ohala, L. Hinton & J. Nichols (Eds.) Sound Symbolism. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press }}</ref> An example of this [[sound symbolism]] in the English language is the use of words starting with ''sn-''. Some of these words symbolize concepts related to the nose (''sneeze'', ''snot'', ''snore''). This does not mean that all words with that sound relate to the nose, but at some level we recognize a sort of symbolism associated with the sound itself. Onomatopoeia, while a facet of language, is also in a sense outside of the confines of language.<ref name=":1">{{cite journal |last1=Seyedi |first1=Hosein |last2=Baghoojari |first2=ELham Akhlaghi |title=The Study of Onomatopoeia in the Muslims' Holy Write: Qur'an |journal=Language in India |date=May 2013 |volume=13 |issue=5 |pages=16–24 |url=http://languageinindia.com/may2013/elhamonomatopoeiafinal.pdf }}</ref>

In linguistics, onomatopoeia is described as the connection, or symbolism, of a sound that is interpreted and reproduced within the context of a language, usually out of mimicry of a sound.<ref name=":2">{{Cite journal |last=Bredin |first=Hugh |date=August 1, 1996 |title=Onomatopoeia as a Figure and a Linguistic Principle |journal=New Literary History |volume=27 |issue=3 |pages=555–569 |doi=10.1353/nlh.1996.0031 |s2cid=143481219 |issn=1080-661X}}</ref> It is a figure of speech, in a sense. Considered a vague term on its own, there are a few varying defining factors in classifying onomatopoeia. In one manner, it is defined simply as the imitation of some kind of non-vocal sound using the vocal sounds of a language, like the hum of a bee being imitated with a "buzz" sound. In another sense, it is described as the phenomena of making a new word entirely.

Onomatopoeia works in the sense of symbolizing an idea in a phonological context, not necessarily constituting a direct meaningful word in the process.<ref name=":3">{{Cite journal |last=Laing |first=C. E. |date=September 15, 2014 |title=A phonological analysis of onomatopoeia in early word production |journal=First Language |volume=34 |issue=5 |pages=387–405 |language=en |doi=10.1177/0142723714550110|s2cid=147624168 }}</ref> The symbolic properties of a sound in a word, or a [[phoneme]], is related to a sound in an environment, and are restricted in part by a language's own phonetic inventory, hence why many languages can have distinct onomatopoeia for the same natural sound. Depending on a language's connection to a sound's meaning, that language's onomatopoeia inventory can differ proportionally. For example, a language like English generally holds little symbolic representation when it comes to sounds, which is the reason English tends to have a smaller representation of sound mimicry than a language like Japanese, which overall has a much higher amount of symbolism related to the sounds of the language.