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Bouba/kiki effect

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Re: Bouba/kiki effect

#171

Post by userbinator »

AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #161

Interesting. I was given a similar "test" in high school, although the names given were Kepick and Oona. But the same preference was there: "kepick" with its "sharp" sounds favored the angled drawing, "Oona" the more undulating. There were some other questions as well, such as a hypothetical about which shape was male and which female (strong preference in the class towards "Oona" being female). I don't think I'm alo…

Oona is an actual female name, very common in Finnish. Incidentally, "onna" also means female in Japanese.

"Kepick" sounds like a lockpicking tool, which also tends to be sharp and pointy.

Re: Bouba/kiki effect

#172

Post by troad »

int_19h wrote: post #111
acyou wrote: post #55

Mama/dada effect: Children everywhere in the world say mamamama as their first syllable, which is why mama means mother both in Chinese and in anglo-franco-hispanic-germanic-latin languages, and everywhere else. They then say dada, baba, papa, which is why baba means dad in both China and in latin languages. Ramachandran and Hubbard suggest that the kiki/bouba effect has implications for the evolution of language, be…

While "mama" is a very common word for "mother" across languages, it is by no means universal. A particularly startling example is Georgian, where "mama" means dad, and "deda" means mom (and note that this is an Indo-European language!). Which is to say - there's no single "first syllable" and "second syllable" that all babies say in that exact order. They just babble, and adults interpret those noises as syllables a…

(Georgian is not an Indo-European language, but I totally agree with the overall point.)

Re: Bouba/kiki effect

#173

Post by dclowd9901 »

FabHK wrote: post #86
dclowd9901 wrote: post #83

I have likened this effect to “what sounds right.” I am curious about something with German, and would love feedback from native German speakers: “gendering” on German words seems to be largely arbitrary (as opposed to the romantic languages where gendering seems to align with how the culture associates the word to a gender). My suspicion, that has “felt” correct in most cases, is that gendering in German words is la…

Doesn't sound plausible to me. It does seem arbitrary more than related to the sound. There is der Titel and der Tisch , but die Tinte and die Tasche , das Tier but die Tür , etc. ETA: Having said that, certain endings strongly indicate a specific gender, e.g. for masculine: -or, -ling, -ner, -smus, -er, -ich, -ist, -ant, and -us. See e.g. here: https://grammar.collinsdictionary.com/german-easy-learning/h...

Thank you for your insights!

Re: Bouba/kiki effect

#174

Post by dclowd9901 »

inglor_cz wrote: post #159
dclowd9901 wrote: post #83

I have likened this effect to “what sounds right.” I am curious about something with German, and would love feedback from native German speakers: “gendering” on German words seems to be largely arbitrary (as opposed to the romantic languages where gendering seems to align with how the culture associates the word to a gender). My suspicion, that has “felt” correct in most cases, is that gendering in German words is la…

There is a lot of randomness in linguistic gendering ... Czech genders are rather different from German genders, even though we are neighbours. Der Frosch (M, "frog") vs. ta žába (F). Das Messer (N, "knife") vs. ten nůž (M). Die Tat (F, "deed, act") vs. ten čin (M).

I’ve heard Czech spoken at full speed and I’m pretty sure it’s one language I’ll never actually learn

Re: Bouba/kiki effect

#175

Post by inglor_cz »

dclowd9901 wrote: post #174
inglor_cz wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a lot of randomness in linguistic gendering ... Czech genders are rather different from German genders, even though we are neighbours. Der Frosch (M, "frog") vs. ta žába (F). Das Messer (N, "knife") vs. ten nůž (M). Die Tat (F, "deed, act") vs. ten čin (M).

I’ve heard Czech spoken at full speed and I’m pretty sure it’s one language I’ll never actually learn

Right now I am in Bilbao and I am pretty sure the same way about Basque. It is more of a stream cipher.

Re: Bouba/kiki effect

#176

Post by mionhe »

mionhe wrote: post #82
avg_dev wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you know, i think this skill can be learned. i used to definitely have very little ability to "bridge sensory modalities", but i've been studying music and performance as a hobby somewhat seriously for about 6 years now. and i now feel like i have much more of that ability than i did before. i probably had it as a kid, just as you were saying, but i am definitely well into adulthood now :) (there is a radio program i…

That's interesting. Does that program have a name? I'm interested in looking it up...

Thanks!
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