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The
Affective Component of Sound in Meaning
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When we
teach meaning in language, we usually resort to the solid security offered by the
authority of the dictionary. But the assistance that dictionaries-even the best of
them-afford us is retarded by the dual nature of semantics: the meaning and the
meaning-potential of words. The former with its clearly demarcated boundaries and concrete
nature poses little problem for the lexicographer; but the nebulous quality of the latter
is harder to crystallize in clearcut definition, simply because meaning-potential stems
from an amalgamation of cultural, experiential, and sensory imprints gathered over a
lifetime and varies from individual to individual. The mysterious power that words have
cannot be attributed solely to their meaning, since they move us by their sound, texture,
shape, colour, and even taste.
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The following extract from
Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass is an illustration of the truth that
linguistic meaning is frequently dependent on a complex wealth of sensory details.
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"Twas brillig, and
the slithy toves Did gyre and gimble in the wabe; All mimsy were the borogoves, And the
mome raths outgrabe."
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"That's enough to
begin with," Humpty Dumpty interrupted. "There are plenty of hard words there. Brillig
means four o'clock in the afternoon-the time when you begin broiling things for
dinner."
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"That'll do very
well," said Alice. "And slithy? "
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"Well, slithy
means `lithe and slimy.' `Lithe' is the same as `active.' You see, it's like a
portmanteau-there are two meanings packed up into one word."
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"I see it now,"
Alice remarked thought- fully. "And what are toves? "
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"Well, toves
are something like badgers-they are something like lizards-and they're something like
corkscrews."
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"They must be very
curious-looking creatures."
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"They are that,"
said Humpty Dumpty. "Also, they make their nests under sun-dials-also, they live on
cheese."
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"And what's to gyre
and to gimble? "
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"To gyre is to
go round and round like a gyroscope. To gimble is to make holes like a
gimlet."
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"And the wabe
is the grass plot round a sundial, I suppose?" said Alice, surprised at her own
ingenuity.
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"Of course, it is. It
is called wabe you know, because it goes a long way before it, and a long way behind
it."
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"And a long way
beyond it on each side," Alice added.
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"Exactly so. Well,
then, mimsy is `flimsy and miserable' (There's another portmanteau for you). And a borogove
is a thin, shabby-looking bird with its feathers sticking out all round-something like a
live mop."
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"And then mome
raths? " said Alice. "I'm afraid I'm giving you a great deal of
trouble."
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"Well, a rath
is a sort of green pig, but mome I'm not certain about. I think it's short for
`from home' meaning that they'd lost their way, you know."
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"And what does outgrabe
mean?"
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"Well, outgrabing
is something between bellowing and whistling, with a kind of sneeze in the middle.
However, you'll hear it done, maybe- down in the wood yonder-and when you've heard it,
you'll be quite content." (pp. 166-7).
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By divesting words of
sense, Lewis Carroll has provided us with an effective demonstration of how by mere sound
and shape, we can build meaning into even nonsensical words, especially in our
subconscious, just as in a little girl's dreams.
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Vocabulary building through onomatopoeia
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If we paused to reflect on
the probable origin of words in a language like English, we would discover an
astonishingly large number of words which convey through sound and syllable, auditory
portraits of what they represent. This onomatopoeic influence determines our reactions to
words and our choice of the mot juste on occasion.
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As human beings, a lot of
what goes on within us takes shape through nonverbal mediums: color, sound, taste, smell,
and touch. If we express what is within us through language, then we are employing sound
to convey color, taste, smell, and touch. Our sensory reactions to sound are innate
components of our linguistic performance.
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This is precisely why our
language tends to touch us at the most profound levels of our being; a bond of intimacy
between a language and its users that excludes those whose involvement is no more than an
intellectual exercise that leaves the rest of their humanness untouched. This underlines
why the best part of language can seldom be taught but must be acquired. Internalizing a
language means learning to communicate the kaleidoscopic nature of our inner meaning
through sound. This means that the inflections of sound must correspond with the nuances
of meaning, for in language as in music, we give shape to sense through sound.
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Inculcating an awareness
of and sensitivity to sound is far more vital to language teaching than we think. Syntax
and vocabulary may be mastered in a relatively short time, but an acute and accurate ear
for the subtleties of semantics takes a much longer time to develop. Response to sound is
an affective factor that has psychological implications on the relationship between
language and its users. The more the learner is aware of the infinite meaning-potential in
words, the greater will be the likelihood for fluent and fluid expression in the target
language. But, this cannot be taught; at best, we can only make our students aware of it
by actualizing the elusive through tangible experience with poetry-where sound is
deliberately and fully employed to construct dimensions of meaning to delight language
users.
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Poetry generally offers a
total language experience under the microscope, in the sense that the non-lexical aspects
of language, such as sound, intonation, stress, pattern, and rhythm-can be isolated and
studied and their contribution to the overall impact of meaning more fully appreciated.
After all, the supreme achievement of poets is to make "connections among sounds,
images, and ideas" (O'Hara:8) as in a well-known example:
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"Whenas in silks my
Julia goes Then, then (methinks) how sweetly flows That liquefaction of her clothes."
(Herrick:20)
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The combined alliterative
effect of the voiced consonants /w/, /n/, /l/, /dz/, the sibilants /s/, /z/ and the
elongated sounds of the rhymed words create an auditory image of the sinuous flow of a
silken gown.
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A contrasting effect is
evident in the following line taken from Wilfred Owen's Anthem For Doomed Youth
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"Only the stuttering
rifles' rapid rattle"
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where the short accented
syllables and cacophonic effect of the /r/ and /t/ imitate the staccato report of gunfire.
The same poem dramatically slows down to a fu- nereal solemnity with the concluding line
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"And each slow dusk a
drawing down of blinds."
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Here, the syllables are
drawn out on the vowel sounds to produce a dolorous effect. The poet William Packard
(1974:21) employs a light stress on short, sibilant syllables to capture the quick,
ephemeral movements of
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"those voices silver
fish in the invisible river."
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The compatibility
of sound and sense promotes a three-dimensional depth to meaning
in each of these examples. However, when we teach vocabulary,
what is often ignored or glossed over, is the affective component-those
non-linguistic features that personally affect us. Words per se
are only the tip of the iceberg. The greater part of meaning-potential
is adduced largely through the nonlinguistic features of sound,
intonation, and syllabic rhythm. These are the aspects of language
use that must be emphasized in a poetry class.
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The meaning-potential of a poem
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A poem must never be used
as a sample of straightforward communication as teachers will invariably encounter the
stumbling block of poetic license which permits eccentric grammatical construction and
word coinage. In poetry, meaning (as restricted by lexicography) must always be held
subservient to meaning-potential. What the poet says is usually secondary to the manner in
which s/he says it. Take for example, Alfred Dorn's The Knowledge of Silence:
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Silence is not an empty
room Where entering mind grows void in vacancy, But a museum where the self collects Its
past in marble.
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Here is yet the bloom Of
vanished laughter held in tinted stone, For here is all the sculpting mind has known. Here
is the white lucidity of tasks Perfected; here stand jagged blocks of pain Broken from
time.
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And here the mind at last
Endures the pitiless light beneath its mask.
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An examination of the
poem's semantic structure should be compartmentalized into two levels. The first is the
basic meaning that is universally perceived. In this case, the subject is the human mind
with its store of memories of experiences-both good and bad-that is likened to a museum as
a treasure house of past achievements. The poem's fundamental message should be understood
first because it is the basis upon which the reader's egocentric sensory perceptions will
be constructed. The latter is the combined result of what the reader builds from within
and without-knowledge of the world gained through practical experience and inner-sense
perceptions of this world. Diagrammatically, our comprehension of a poem would look like
this:
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Obviously, the basic meaning of the poem is the most tangible thing about it. The rest of
its meaning has, quite literally, to permeate through its atmosphere.
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Our initial appreciation
of a poem is largely acoustical, since the poet conveys atmosphere through sound and
movement. (See Footnote 1 ) When
the poem is read aloud, the regularity of the stress patterns and the speed with which
syllables move will determine largely our response to the content. The atmosphere has to
be appreciated as a whole before being broken down to individual words and their separate,
image-evoking contributions to sound/sense. A vocabulary lesson drawn from a poem calls
upon the creative and imaginative faculties in students-qualities which are vital to
dynamic communication.
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The central metaphor of
the poem under discussion, around which its atmosphere is created, is the museum-quiet and
hushed with the aura of stepping back in time. The lines appropriately move with a slow,
measured tread. The sounds are mellow with a few exceptions, as in the phrase "jagged
blocks of pain" where the sharpness of "jagged" is juxtaposed with the
heaviness of "blocks," highlighting through sound two qualities of pain. The
harsh glare of light is conveyed through the whiplash sound of "pitiless" with
its short, swift, accented syllables; and the hush of the museum is established with the
poem's opening word.
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With the mellow consonants
/s/, /l/, /n/, the higher pitched /ay/, the elongated sound of /e/ dying away on the final
sibilant sound, the word silence is onomatopoeic. Other examples from this poem are
lucidity with its soft fluid caress, the consonant clusters in sculpting
chipping lightly like a chisel on stone, the bloom of laughter , softly pink and
fragrant ( tinted ), emptiness echoing in room, the rounded void suggesting the
spatial roundness of the sky, etc.
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Exploiting the affective component of poetry
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To teach what is largely
imaginative and intuitive, certain practical steps may be followed:
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- Supply the students with the orthodox meaning of the words as
defined by the dictionary.
- Ask the students to "feel" the words, seeing how the
sounds match meanings. Get them to visualize the words through sound-round, long, hard,
soft, harsh, prickly, sweet, and so on.
- With the individual words seen in this new light, have the
students examine the words again in the context of the poem to see how the poet may have
been subtly influencing us.
- Ask the students to identify synonyms for the words used in the
poem, e.g. silence, hush, quiet, peace, etc. and discuss what variation in meaning
would result if they were used instead. (See Footnote 2 )
- Ask the students to write a short poem of their own. (The class
should have encouraged them to manipulate the sound of words in a little
"poetry" of their own creation.)
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The possibilities arising
from experimentation with these basic steps are endless, but the results will always be
delightful. Learners will never consider a language class as dull if their teachers
exploit the full potential of the human imagination. After all, as language users, why
shouldn't they share with the poets, this empathy with the full richness of meaning molded
into sound, that is a human language?
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Mary Mahir teaches literature to EFL students at the An-Najah
University, Department of English in Amman, Jordan. |
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- Carroll, L. 1970. Alice in Wonderland. New York City: Western
Publishing Co.
- Dorn, A. 1974. The knowledge of silence. In The Logic of Poetry,
ed. R. Monaco and J. Briggs. New York: McGraw-Hill Inc.
- Herrick, R. 1974. When as in silks my Julia goes. In The Logic of
Poetry, ed. R. Monaco and J. Briggs. New York: McGraw-Hill.
- O'Hara, J. D. 1975. Poetry. New York: Newsweek Books.
- Owen, W. 1972. Anthem for doomed youth. The New Oxford Book of
English Verse, ed. H. Gardner. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
- Packard, W. 1974. Those voices. In The Logic of Poetry, ed. R.
Monaco and J. Briggs. New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc.
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Footnote 1
The later, more comprehensive analyses of the poem are the
results of a process of cognitive deliberation, in which experiential knowledge and memory
associations (triggered by specific words) are combined with forms of impressionistic
data.
Footnote 2
To show how sound affects meaning, I once offered my students a
simple but practical demonstration with Tennyson's poem "Break, break, break,"
among others. The opening lines "Break, break, break, On thy cold gray stones, O
Sea!" became "Crash, crash, crash, on thy cold gray rocks, Ocean."
Synonymous, you would say. Or is it?
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