37
Excerpt 4.4
From the high rooftops, down to the sea No one‟s as dear, as baby to me
Wee little fingers, eyes wide and bright
Now sound asleep, until morning light
The case occurring in Excerpt 4.4 is similar to Excerpt 4.3. The song title of Excerpt 4.4 is Rock a Bye Baby whose content is almost the same as Excerpt
4.3 has. It told the mother‟s aim of soothing and lulling her baby by expressing
her admiration to him through a harmonic note. Her admiration was depicted in her phrases describing the cuteness of her bonny baby, i.e. wee little fingers, and
eyes wide and bright . Again, a form of diminutive was used in describing the
baby‟s small physical features, namely the word wee. The phonetic transcription of the word wee is wi
ː, which the sound [i] within it plays a role as a high front vowel representing a diminutive form or small object. The word wee itself
actually functions to represent a very small size or little amount see Appendix F.
3. Conventional Sound Symbolism
Based on the research findings on lullabies, conventional sound symbolism emerged most frequently than the other two sound symbolism
categories. This category reached 40 or six out of fifteen words for conventional sound symbolic only. It did not count the conventional sound symbolic words
belonging to other categories too, which attained exactly the same percentage as the words indicating conventional sound symbolism only see Table 4.1. As
Hinton et al. 1994, p. 5 stated, words can be considered as conventional sound
38 symbolic words if within their structure, there are certain phonemes or clusters
sharing similar features representing particular ideas.
Table 4.3 Conventional Sound Symbolic Words in Lullabies No.
Word Number of
Occurrence Function
1.
bark 1 time
to represent the act of making a loud, rough noise made by a dog and some other animals
2.
chirp 1 time
to represent the act of making a short, sharp, high- pitched sound of a small bird or an insect
3.
cricket 1 time
to represent a brown or black insect related to grasshoppers but with shorter legs, noted for the
chirping notes or short loud noises produced by the male by rubbing its wings together
4.
cry 2 times
to represent the act of producing tears from eyes while making loud sounds because of pain, sorrow, or
other strong emotions
5.
float 1 time
to represent the act of moving or hovering slowly and lightly in a liquid or the air
6.
flutter 3 times
to represent the act of moving up and down or from side to side with quick light wavering or flapping
motions
7.
fly 5 times
to represent the act of moving in or pass through the air with wings
8.
gleam 1 time
to represent the phenomenon of producing or reflecting a small, bright light
9.
string 1 time
to represent a thin wire or nylon cord producing a range of notes by vibration depending on its
thickness, length, and tightness to a musical instrument
10.
swing 1 time
to represent the act of moving easily and without interruption backwards and forwards or from side to
side while suspended or on an axis
11.
tip 1 time
to represent the pointed or rounded end or extremity of something slender or tapering;
12.
wee 1 time
to represent a very small size or little amount
possessing more than one sound symbolism category
Table 4.3 shows that there were twelve words indicating conventional sound symbolism within their structure based on this research finding. It
39 comprised six words of conventional sound symbolism, and other six words
belonging to the combination between conventional and other two categories of sound symbolism as presented in Table 4.1, namely imitative and synesthetic
sound symbolism. It means that a half of the entire words in Table 4.3 brought a single sound symbolism category, whereas another half brought double categories.
Table 4.4 Phonesthemic Sounds and Their Meaning of Conventional Sound Symbolic Words in Lullabies
No. Sound
Symbolism Category
Phonesthemic Sound
Meaning Frequency
Example
1.
Conventional kr-
noisy impact 2
cricket , cry
fl- movement in air
2 float, fly
gl- unmoving light
1 gleam
str- 1 dimensional,
flexible 1
string
As viewed in Table 4.4, there are four phonesthemic sounds appearing in lullabies; they are kr-, fl-, gl-, and str-. Each phonesthemic sound represented a
particular meaning. The word cricket and cry were the examples of the words having kr- onset which causes noisy impact Bloomfield, 1933, as cited in Abelin,
1999, p. 32. A cricket referred to an insect producing short loud noise see Table 4.3 or Appendix F which did its activity during the night time. At the same time,
the word cry also described an act of producing tears while making a loud sound or noise by a child or baby see Table 4.3 or Appendix F. Although both of words
possessed similar functions of producing loud sounds yet there was a difference
