Talk:Sound mimesis in various cultures

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Original research by synthesis?

Now it came across my mind: I hope that Imitation of natural sounds in various cultures does not hurt Wikipedia:No original research#Synthesis of published material serving to advance a position. The parts are referenced, but the introductory and transduction sentences can theoretically be problematic. Fortunately, most of intro and transduction sentences are rather trivial (typically, "The imitation of natural sounds in various cultures is a diverse phenomenon, and can fill in various functions. In several instances, it is related to the belief system ... It may serve also such practical goals as ..."), thus, they do not convey any new step. But I must consider the whole. I am afraid making original research by synthesis is hard to notice for me, I may make faults here.

Physis 00:12, 14 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

it's a bit problematic. Already the title sounds too much like ad-hoc synthesis. I wish this could be merged into either of Onomatopoeia, Sound symbolism or Ethnomusicology. dab (𒁳) 17:06, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thank You very much for the feedback. It affects two important questions

is the article discussing a real thing "out there" in the world, or is it an arbitrary, ad hoc collection of loosely connected phenomena?
is merging appropriate?

For addressing both questions, I want to consult the sources, I shall do that tomorrow, it's midnight now in Hungary. To forecast the essence: my motivation for creating this topic as a standalone article was that the following links can be grasped and made explicit:

Yoiks (at least some of them) imitate natural sounds, and are related to Sami shamanism. Inuit throat singing (some of them) imitate natural sounds, but are not related to shamanism among Eskimo peoples: they are used for entertainment, and similar onomatopoeic songs may be used in hunt for luring game. The Tuvan throat singing imitates natural sounds, and the underlying motivation for it may lie in animistic beliefs. And in several cultures, shaman songs imitate natural sounds as well, but this phenomenon is not restricted to shamanism, and examples of shamanisms have many other important features other than onomatopoeia.

Merging is inherently an information-losing process, and should be applied with care. It implies part-whole relationship, and as image illustrates, it does not fit for some things. Although sophisticated use of "section links" provide a temporary solution even for over-merged articles, but section links are a fragile tool: they do not redirect, even the smallest rename makes them broken.

Physis 00:27, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Although both Ethnomusicology and Sound symbolism seem for me related topics, I think merging with one of them would make link system harder. Essentially because of the immanent information-losing nature of merging, discussed above. I feel that there are too many cross-cutting concerns and orthogonal concepts in the proposed merging candidates. Such cross-cutting concepts can be grasped and made explicit only by Decomposition, separation of concerns, reusability, modularity).

Meging with Onomatopoeia seems to be appropriate. But my feeling is that Onomatopoeia article seems for me to concentrate on linguistic phenomena. This raises two counter-arguments

Imitation of natural sounds in various cultures concentrates on cultural phenomena. Cultural versus linguistic articles are often contrasted in Wikipedia: Russian people vs Russian language, Yupik vs Yupik languages, Sireniki Eskimos vs Sireniki Eskimo language. They are not merged, despite of the fact that language can often be regarded as part of culture.
I think (but I cannot prove or illustrate), that onomatopoeia is present in almost all languages (in a lesser or larger extent). But Imitation of natural sounds in various cultures is something not so widespread: if a cultural phenomenon can be linked to onomatopoeia, then it has something interesting underlying reason: luring game in a hunter culture, or underlying animistic beliefs, or invocation of teriomorphic spirits etc.

I propose thus:

If the problem is the too essay-like, lengthy name of the article, then it can be renamed to something like onomatopoeia in culture.
I admit that onomatopoeia in culture can be regarded as part of onomatopoeia, but instead of merging, I propose using writing a subsection with a summary, linking to the standalone article with {{main}} template.

Best wishes,

Physis 11:55, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]