{{short description|Pleasantness associated with the sounds of words or parts of words}} {{use British English|date=November 2022}} {{use dmy dates|date=November 2022}} '''Phonaesthetics''' (also spelled '''phonesthetics''' in North America) is the study of the beauty and pleasantness associated with the sounds of certain words or parts of words. The term was first used in this sense, perhaps by {{nowrap|J. R. R. Tolkien,}}<ref>Holmes, John R. (2010) "'[https://books.google.com/books?id=AOS74uZTasYC&q=%22Tolkien+coined+the+term%22 Inside a Song': Tolkien's Phonaesthetics]". In: Eden, Bradford Lee (ed.). ''Middle-earth Minstrel''. McFarland. p. 30</ref> during the mid-20th century and derives {{etymology|grc|''{{wikt-lang|grc|φωνή}}'' ({{grc-transl|φωνή}})|voice, sound||''{{wikt-lang|grc|αἰσθητική}}'' ({{grc-transl|αἰσθητική}})|aesthetics}}. Speech sounds have many aesthetic qualities, some of which are subjectively regarded as ''euphonious'' (pleasing) or ''cacophonous'' (displeasing). Phonaesthetics remains a budding and often subjective field of study, with no scientifically or otherwise formally established definition; today, it mostly exists as a marginal branch of psychology, phonetics, or poetics.<ref>Shisler, Benjamin K. (1997). [https://www.oocities.org/soho/studios/9783/phonpap1.html Phonesthetics]". ''The Influence of Phonesthesia on the English Language''.</ref>
British linguist David Crystal has regarded phonaesthetics as the study of "phonaesthesia" (i.e., sound symbolism and phonesthemes): that not just words but even certain sound combinations within a particular language carry meaning.<ref>{{cite book |last=Crystal |first=David |title=A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics |date=2011 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=9781444356755 |page=364 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=3ZPQVuSgDAkC&pg=PT364 |language=en}}</ref> For example, he shows that English speakers tend to associate unpleasantness with the sound ''sl-'' in such words as ''sleazy'', ''slime'', ''slug'', and ''slush'',<ref>{{cite book |last=Crystal |first=David |title=A Dictionary of Language |date=2001 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |isbn=978-0226122038 |page=260 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3GU5FWs1pBEC&pg=PA260 }}</ref> or they associate repetition lacking any particular shape with {{not a typo|''-tter''}} in such words as ''chatter'', ''glitter'', ''flutter'', and ''shatter''.<ref>Allan, Keith (2014). "[https://books.google.com/books?id=UULIAgAAQBAJ&q=%224.9.3+Phonesthesia%22 Phonesthesia]". ''Linguistic Meaning''. Routledge Library Editions: Linguistics.</ref>
== {{anchor|Euphony|Cacophony}} Euphony and cacophony == {{redirect-multi|2|Cacophony|Euphony}}
Euphony is the effect of sounds being perceived as pleasant, rhythmical, lyrical, or harmonious.<ref>{{cite web|url = http://web.cn.edu/kwheeler/lit_terms_C.html |title=CACOPHONY, Literary Terms and Definition by Carson-Newman University|access-date=2013-09-10}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url = https://literarydevices.net/cacophony/ |title=Definition of Cacophony|date=19 August 2013|access-date=2013-09-10}}</ref><ref name="ElizabethPodhaizer2001">{{cite book |last1=Elizabeth |first1=Mary |last2=Podhaizer |first2=Mary Elizabeth |title=Painless Poetry |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PL-Lpq-BbucC&pg=RA1-PT186 |year=2001 |publisher=Barron's Educational Series |isbn=978-0-7641-1614-8 |chapter=Euphony}}</ref> Cacophony is the effect of sounds being perceived as harsh, unpleasant, chaotic, and often discordant; these sounds are perhaps meaningless and jumbled together.<ref>{{cite web |title=Cacophony |url=http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/cacophony?s=t |website=Dictionary.com |access-date=26 July 2015}}</ref> This is similar to consonance and dissonance in music, which are pleasant and unpleasant sounds respectively. In poetry, for example, euphony may be used deliberately to convey comfort, peace, or serenity, while cacophony may be used to convey discomfort, pain, or disorder. This is often furthered by the combined effect of the meaning beyond just the sounds themselves.
The California Federation of Chaparral Poets uses Emily Dickinson's "A Bird came down the Walk" as an example of euphonious poetry, one passage being "...Oars divide the Ocean, / Too silver for a seam" and John Updike's "Player Piano" as an example of cacophonous poetry, one passage being "My stick fingers click with a snicker / And, chuckling, they knuckle the keys".<ref>{{cite web |title=Poetic Devices |url=http://www.chaparralpoets.org/devices.pdf |website=chaparralpoets.org |access-date=12 April 2017}}</ref>
== Research == David Crystal's 1995 paper "Phonaesthetically Speaking" explores lists, created by reader polls and individual writers, of English words that are commonly regarded as sounding beautiful, to search for any patterns within the words' phonetics. Frequently recurring example words in these lists include ''gossamer'', ''melody'', and ''tranquil''. Crystal's finding, assuming a British Received Pronunciation accent, is that words perceived as pretty tend to have a majority of a wide array of criteria; here are some major ones:<ref>Crystal, David (1995). "[https://web.archive.org/web/20200530122205/http://www.davidcrystal.com/?fileid=-4009 Phonaesthetically Speaking]". ''English Today'' 42.2 (April): 8–12. Cambridge University Press.</ref> *Three or more syllables (e.g., ''goss·a·mer'' and ''mel·o·dy'') *Stress on the first syllable (e.g., ''góssamer'' and ''mélody'') *{{IPAc-en|l}} is the most common consonant phoneme, followed by {{IPAc-en|m|,_|s|,_|n|,_|r|,_|k|,_|t|,_|d}}, then a huge drop-off before other consonants (e.g., ''<u>l</u>u<u>m</u>i<u>n</u>ou<u>s</u>'' contains the first four) *Short vowels (e.g., the schwa, followed in order by the vowels in ''lid'', ''led'', and ''lad'') are favored over long vowels and diphthongs (e.g., as in ''lied'', ''load'', ''loud'') *Three or more manners of articulation (with approximant consonants the most common, followed by stop consonants, and so on) A perfect example word, according to these findings, is ''tremulous''. Crystal also suggests the invented words {{not a typo|''ramelon''}} {{IPAc-en|ˈ|r|æ|m|ə|l|ɒ|n}} and {{not a typo|''drematol''}} {{IPAc-en|ˈ|d|r|ɛ|m|ə|t|ɒ|l}}, which he notes are similar to the types of names often employed in the marketing of pharmaceutical drugs.
== ''Cellar door'' == [[File:Hobbit hole with red door.jpg|thumb|The entrance of the "hobbit hole", which Tolkien devised, is a type of "cellar door", the idea of whose phonetic beauty he popularized.]]
The English compound noun ''cellar door'' has been widely cited as an example of a word or phrase that is beautiful purely in terms of its sound (i.e., euphony) without inherent regard for its meaning.<ref name="barrett">{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/14/magazine/14FOB-onlanguage-t.html |title=On Language: Cellar Door |last=Barrett |first=Grant |date=14 February 2010 |work=New York Times Magazine |page=16}}</ref> The phenomenon of ''cellar door'' being regarded as euphonious appears to have begun in the very early twentieth century, first attested in the 1903 novel ''Gee-Boy'' by the Shakespeare scholar Cyrus Lauron Hooper. It has been promoted as beautiful-sounding by various writers; linguist Geoffrey Nunberg specifically names the writers H. L. Mencken in 1920; David Allan Robertson in 1921; Dorothy Parker, Hendrik Willem van Loon, and Albert Payson Terhune in the 1930s; George Jean Nathan in 1935; J. R. R. Tolkien in a lecture, "English and Welsh", delivered in 1955 (in which he described his reverence for the Welsh language and about which he said "''cellar doors'' [i.e. beautiful words] are extraordinarily frequent"; see also Sound and language in Middle-earth); and C. S. Lewis in 1963.<ref name="barrett"/><ref name="nunberg">{{cite web |url=https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2142 |title=The Romantic Side of Familiar Words |last=Nunberg |first=Geoff |date=26 February 2010 |work=Language Log |access-date=27 February 2010}}</ref> Furthermore, the phenomenon itself is touched upon in many sources and media, including anonymous short pieces in the September 1905 issue of ''Harper's Magazine''{{Efn|The piece is a vignette about a Spaniard that told to an American lady: "Your language too has soft and beautiful words, but they are not always appreciated. What could be more musical than your word ''cellar-door''?""<ref>{{cite magazine |date=September 1905 |title=Editor's Drawer |magazine=Harper's Magazine |page=645 |url=https://archive.org/details/sim_harpers-magazine_1905-09_111_664/page/n175}}</ref>}} and the August 1919 issue of ''Cartoons Magazine'',<ref>{{Cite journal |date=August 1919 |title=It's Like This: The Most Beautiful Word |url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=osu.32435069201556&seq=124 |journal=Cartoons Magazine |volume=16 |issue=2 |pages=281 |via=HathiTrust}}</ref> the 1967 novel ''Why Are We in Vietnam?'' by Norman Mailer, the 1967 play ''It's Called the Sugar Plum'' by Israel Horovitz,<ref>{{cite book |title=It's Called the Sugar Plum: A Play |author=Israel Horovitz |page=25 |publisher=Dramatists Play Service Inc |year=1968 |isbn=0-8222-0581-5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ydb3-ghkHxkC&dq=%22Cellar+door%22&pg=PA25}}</ref> a 1991 essay by Jacques Barzun,<ref>Jacques Barzun, ''An Essay on French Verse for Readers of English Poetry'' (New Directions, 1991). {{ISBN|0-8112-1157-6}}: "I discovered its illusory character when many years ago a Japanese friend with whom I often discussed literature told me that to him and some of his English-speaking friends the most beautiful word in our language was 'cellardoor'. It was not beautiful to me and I wondered where its evocative power lay for the Japanese. Was it because they find l and r difficult to pronounce, and the word thus acquires remoteness and enchantment? I asked, and learned also that Tatsuo Sakuma, my friend, had never seen an American cellar door, either inside a house or outside — the usual two flaps on a sloping ledge. No doubt that lack of visual familiarity added to the word’s appeal. He also enjoyed going to restaurants and hearing the waiter ask if he would like salad or roast vegetables, because again the phrase 'salad or' could be heard. I concluded that its charmlessness to speakers of English lay simply in its meaning. It has the l and r sounds and d and long o dear to the analysts of verse music, but it is prosaic. Compare it with 'celandine', where the image of the flower at once makes the sound lovely."</ref> the 2001 psychological drama film ''Donnie Darko'',<ref>{{cite journal|last=Kois|first=Dan|date=23 July 2003|title=Everything you were afraid to ask about "Donnie Darko"|journal=Slate|url=https://www.salon.com/2004/07/23/darko/}}</ref><ref>Ross Smith, ''Inside Language'', Walking Tree Publishers (2007), p. 65)</ref> and a scene in the 2019 movie ''Tolkien''.
The origin of ''cellar door'' being considered as an inherently beautiful or musical phrase is mysterious. However, in 2014, Nunberg speculated that the phenomenon might have arisen from Philip Wingate and Henry W. Petrie's 1894 hit song "I Don't Want to Play in Your Yard", which contains the lyric "You'll be sorry when you see me sliding down our cellar door." Following the song's success, "slide down my cellar door" became a popular catchphrase up until the 1930s or 1940s to mean engaging in a type of friendship or camaraderie reminiscent of childhood innocence.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=11136|title=Slide down my cellar door|last=Nunberg|first=Geoff|date=16 March 2014|work=Language Log|access-date=21 March 2014}}</ref>{{efn|Nunberg identifies "Playmates" as an earlier song from which "I Don't Want to Play in Your Yard" was derived; in fact the derivation is the reverse.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=11136#comment-578872|title=GN response to comment by "Emma"|last=Nunberg|first=Geoff|date=17 March 2014|work=Language Log|access-date=21 March 2014}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://newsok.com/words-to-playmates-song-stir-up-controversy/article/2272570|title=Words to "Playmates" Song Stir Up Controversy|last=Lovelace|first=Melba|date=15 July 1989|work=News OK|access-date=21 March 2014}}</ref>}} A 1914 essay about Edgar Allan Poe's choice of the word "Nevermore" in his 1845 poem "The Raven" as being based on euphony may have spawned an unverified legend, propagated by syndicated columnists like Frank Colby in 1949<ref>{{cite news |title=Take My Word For It |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=eZ4yAAAAIBAJ&sjid=w-kFAAAAIBAJ&pg=4752%2C1357975 |last=Colby |first=Frank |date=3 November 1949|work=Miami Daily News|page=45|access-date=1 March 2010}}</ref> and L. M. Boyd in 1979, that ''cellar door'' was Poe's favorite phrase.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=a90hAAAAIBAJ&sjid=pqAFAAAAIBAJ&dq=cellar-door%20english%20word&pg=3537%2C2682286|title=Quoth the raven "cellar door"?|last=Boyd|first=Louis M.|date=15 January 1979|work=Reading Eagle |page=5|access-date=27 February 2010|location=Reading, Pennsylvania}}</ref>
Tolkien, Lewis, and others have suggested that ''cellar door''{{'s}} auditory beauty becomes more apparent the more the word is dissociated from its literal meaning, for example, by using alternative spellings such as ''Selador'', ''Selladore'', ''Celador'', ''Selidor'' (an island name in Ursula K. Le Guin's ''Earthsea'' series), or ''Salidar'' (Robert Jordan's ''The Wheel of Time'' series), which take on the quality of an enchanting name (and some of which suggest a specifically standard British pronunciation of the word: {{IPAc-en|ˌ|s|ɛ|l|ə|ˈ|d|ɔː}}),<ref name="nunberg"/>{{efn|In a 1966 interview, Tolkien said: "Supposing you say some quite ordinary words to me{{emdash}}'cellar door', say. From that, I might think of a name 'Selador', and from that a character, a situation begins to grow".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Zaleski |first1=Philip |last2=Zaleski |first2=Carol |title=The Fellowship: The Literary Lives of the Inklings: J.R.R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Owen Barfield, Charles Williams |date=2015 |publisher=Farrar Straus and Giroux |location=New York |isbn=978-0-374-15409-7 |page=25 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lhToCAAAQBAJ&q=cellar+door&pg=PA25 |language=en}}</ref>}}{{efn|Most English-speaking people ... will admit that ''cellar door'' is 'beautiful', especially if dissociated from its sense (and from its spelling). More beautiful than, say, ''sky'', and far more beautiful than ''beautiful''. Well then, in Welsh for me ''cellar doors'' [i.e. such beautiful words] are extraordinarily frequent, and moving to the higher dimension, the words in which there is pleasure in the contemplation of the association of form and sense are abundant.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Tolkien|first1=J. R. R.|title=Angles and Britons|date=1964|publisher=University of Wales Press|page=36|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nlkZAAAAIAAJ&q=Welsh+cellar+doors|language=en}}</ref>}}<ref>{{cite book|last1=Le Guin|first1=Ursula K.|title=A Wizard Of Earthsea|date=1968|publisher=Parnassus|page=64|isbn=9780553262506|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=T4oD2qEPCysC|language=en}}</ref> which is homophonous with "sell a daw."
== See also == {{wiktionary|phonaesthetics}} * {{annotated link|Affection (linguistics)}} * {{annotated link|Assimilation (linguistics)}} * {{annotated link|Cacofonix}} * {{annotated link|Dissimilation}} * {{annotated link|Epenthesis}} * {{annotated link|Inherently funny word}} * {{annotated link|Japanese sound symbolism}} * {{annotated link|Onomatopoeia}} * {{annotated link|Phonestheme}} * {{annotated link|Phono-semantic matching}} * {{annotated link|Phonosemantics}} * {{annotated link|Sandhi}} ("euphonic" rules in Sanskrit grammar) * {{annotated link|Vogon poetry}} * {{annotated link|Vowel harmony}}
== Notes == {{notelist}}
== References== {{reflist}}
Category:Phonaesthetics Category:Linguistics Category:Phonology Category:Phonotactics