The Name of Crow: A Cross-Cultural Survey of Terms for the Genus Corvus

Abstract

Introduction It often has been claimed that real utility of human language lies in its nature, in our ability to imbue an object, a thing, a thought with transmittable meaning merely by our agreement that certain sounds represent it. It is this unnatural character of language that allows us to express abstract ideas, to quibble over semantics, to explain in detail every moment of a day or to condense its many events into a single word (Good. Bad.) This conception of language was perhaps first cogently articulated by John Locke in his Essay on Human Understanding (Linksy 1967:31) and eventually became one of most powerful paradigms in linguistic thought. Ferdinand de Saussure gave this view much of its modern shape when he argued the bond between and signified is arbitrary (Saussure 1967: 238). Without disputing that essential nature of signifier is perhaps arbitrary, I suggest that this maxim does not capture whole truth. Inquiries into cognition- particularly, transformational grammar-have suggested a structural nonarbitrariness, seeing in syntax evidence of linguistic hard-wiring in our brains. The nature of individual terms has also been questioned recently, and Locke and Saussure are more directly addressed by a revival of fairly ancient ideas about a sort of naturalness in language. Onomatopoeia-the imitation of natural sounds-has played a role in numerous theories concerning origin of language. In this century, possible role of onomatopoeia in lingua genesis has been largely dismissed, or at least relegated to a minor role: Some scholars believe that human speech originated in man's attempt to imitate sounds of nature, as if a child should call a dog 'bow-wow' or a cow 'moo'. No doubt such imitation accounts for a certain number of words in our vocabulary, but there are great difficulties in carrying out theory to its ultimate results (Greenough and Kitteridge: 138). Saussure, arguing arbitrariness of language, addressed onomatopoeia as follows: 1. Onomatopoeia might be used to prove that choice of is not always arbitrary. But onomatopoeic formations are never organic elements of a linguistic system. Besides, their number is much smaller than is generally supposed. Words like French fouet 'whip' or glas 'knell' may strike certain ears with suggestive sonority, but to see that they have not always had this property we need only examine their Latin forms (fouet is derived from fagus 'beech-tree', glas from classicum 'sound of a trumpet'). The quality of their present sounds, or rather quality that is attributed to them, is a fortuitous result of phonetic evolution. As for authentic onomatopoeic words (e.g. glug-glug, tick-tock, etc.) not only are they limited in number, but also they are chosen somewhat arbitrarily, for they are only approximate and more or less conventional imitations of certain sounds (cf. English bow-wow and French ouaoua). In addition, once there words have been introduced into language, they are to a certain extent subjected to same evolution - phonetic, morphological, etc. - that other words undergo (cf. pigeon, ultimately vulgar Latin pif to, derived in turn from an onomatopoeic formation): obvious proof that they lose something of their original character in order to assume that of linguistic sign in general, which in unmotivated (Saussure: 239). Salissures assertions are testable. If signifier is entirely or even usually unconnected (other than semiotically) to signified, then same signified thing will only have same (or even similar) in two different languages under three conditions: 1. If languages are close genetic affiliates (so close that sound shifts Saussure mentions haven't blurred their resemblance) 2. If word has been borrowed from one language by other, or 3. …